Search for Revenge
by Joybug
Summary: Aya decides that finding Schwartz is long overdue. His mind is only focused on finding them and making them pay for what they did. This is story 3 after This Pain You Feel and Mistrut. Schwartz fans might not want to read this. OOC, YOhji x Aya.
1. Chapter 1

I don't own Weiss Kreuz.

Chapter 1

Yohji winked at Aya, each one hiding behind opposite walls as they waited for the target to make her entrance. A murderer that preyed on anyone she thought was a whore. Going to clubs and seeking out anyone drunk enough to follow her home.

Aya put his earpiece in his pocket. He didn't need Omi yacking in his ear while he was trying to concentrate.

He waited for Yohji to make the signal instead of letting Omi tell him what to do. He listened, his hands tensing on his sword when he heard the door open. Was that her? He had no way of telling without peeking around the corner.

Yohji shook his head, no. She wasn't alone, so they had to wait. The last thing they needed was for their identities to be compromised by the victim.

The power was cut. Yohji nodded at him. Aya rushed in, stabbing the woman right through the chest before Yohji could even make a move to help.

"Aya!" Yohji shouted as a man came up behind him. They hadn't known the bitch had an accomplice.

Yohji let his wires loose, wrapping around the man and yanking until the man choked to death on his own blood.

Aya approached Yohji, excited from the kill even as blood dripped from his hair. Yohji looked beautiful like this, even though he didn't have any blood on him. He still had that feral look that Aya loved so much, the look that told Aya exactly what they were going to be doing when they got home.

"Get out of there, I'm setting off the charges in ten seconds," Omi's voice warned, so loud that Aya could see Yohji wince at the volume. Aya was glad his was in his pocket.

Aya grabbed Yohji's hand and made a break for the door, just barely getting to the car before the building exploded.

"How's that for a date," Yohji snickered, leaning in and sucking up a mark on Aya's neck that made his entire body quiver with need.

He was getting home NOW!

"We're fine, Bombay," Yohji announced into the comm. Before turning it off. Aya sped way over the speed limit. He needed Yohji .

"Aya, slow the hell down, if the police pull us over with blood all over you there's going to be a serious problem!" Yohji hissed.

"Only if they can catch up with us," Aya shrugged him off.

Aya slammed on the brakes hard enough to make Yohji fall forward against the dashboard. They were home already? Thank God!

He grabbed Yohji by the front of his mission uniform and dragged him toward the front doors. Omi and Ken still beat them on Ken's bike. Omi held the door open for them, a small blush stealing over his cheeks as Aya dragged Yohji toward the stairs.

"A little eager, eh?" Yohji teased with a small laugh as Aya yanked him up the stairs and into Yohji's room.

Aya shoved his coat off, glaring at Yohji when the man didn't move to do the same. Yohji seemed to get the point and started shoving his own clothes off. Good, because Aya would've torn the clothes to pieces just to get to the naked flesh underneath.

Aya shoved him down onto the bed and straddled him with a wide grin. It was one of the few things that could make Aya smile.

He slammed himself down onto Yohji`s member without any preparation. He didn`t care. He needed him too much to care.

Yohji reached up and touched his cheek as he started to push up further into Aya`s body. That felt so good.

Aya rode him hard, not giving him the option of taking things slow.

`Damn, Aya`` Yohji gasped, pushing even further into him with each thrust. Aya`s head fell back as he started reaching completion. Yohji was giving him what he needed even as the murderer`s blood dripped down onto his face and spattered Yohji`s chest a bit.

They came together, both crying out even though they knew the walls were thin.

`Baby, I think its time for a shower.` Yohji helped Aya stand up, knowing that the man was tired from the adrenaline.

Author`s notes: Another one begins. This will be the last one. J


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Yohji smiled as he looked down at Aya, who was sleeping soundly. He'd gone down to give his mission report to a blushing Omi and by the time he'd come upstairs Aya was fast asleep, his wet hair leaving a damp spot on the pillow.

Yohji slid into the bed beside him, tugging Aya up against his chest.

"You awake?" Yohji whispered.

"Am now," Aya murmured, resting his head against Yohji's shoulder like usual.

"You've been troubled. What's up?" Yohji ran his fingers through Aya's cold hair.

"In the morning. Shut up," Aya muttered, going back to sleep. Yohji sighed at that. He gave Aya a light shake, waking him back up.

"Knock it off!" Aya hissed, rising up on his elbow to glare at him.

"Tell me," Yohji brushed the red locks out of Aya's eyes, trying to keep his smile on when Aya was getting angry.

"In the damned morning. I'm sleeping," Aya tried to lie back down, but Yohji caught him, keeping him sitting.

"Not anymore you aren't," Yohji teased.

Aya just glared and got out of bed, obviously heading back to his own room after throwing on a pair of jeans that Yohji knew were his . Why did everything have to be like pulling teeth just to get an honest answer?

Yohji followed him, stark naked, down the hall.

"Do you mind!" Aya hissed, trying to shove him back into his room.

"Would you two knock it…" Omi stared, his eyes wide as saucers as he stared at Yohji.

"Its one in the morning, can you two please not bitch in the hallway?" Ken growled, coming out wearing nothing but a pair of boxers. His face suddenly matched Omi's, going beat red.

"Go back to your room," Aya shoved him harder this time.

"Not until you talk to me. Remember our conversation about communication? Well, I'm listening, so fess up," Yohji grabbed Aya by the arm and led him back into his bedroom.

"I can't let them get away with what they did to me," Aya said very quietly, like he was expecting a huge outburst from Yohji.

"The collar was my idea, Aya. If you're pissed about it then hit me, but leave…"

"Not the collar!" Aya growled, heading back for the bed.

"Then what…oh, Schwartz! I thought you meant…" Yohji laughed, scratching the back of his head and feeling like a moron for not having guessed that in the first place.

"What do you have in mind?" Yohji asked, moving in to kiss the side of Aya's neck.

"Find them and kill them." Aya traced his lips over the vein that ran down the side of Yohji's neck before sucking up a mark there.

"No, I mean what's your strategy? I'm going with you, but there's four of them. Ken and Omi can come along, too…"

"Just you and me. Someone has to do missions while we're gone. And I haven't come up with anything yet. Mastermind has to go first, though. Otherwise he'll just get inside my head again. He said my thoughts are clear as water, so I have to make my thoughts so random that he'll get a migraine and we can kill him. Other than that I haven't the slightest clue what to do." Aya leaned into his arms, making Yohji smile. He loved moments like this, even if they were talking about Schwartz, when he had Aya all to himself. Where he could hold Aya in his arms and just think about nothing but love.

"Do you think going after them is a good idea?" This time Yohji kissed him chastely on the lips.

"No, but it has to be done," Aya kissed him back, his eyes worried as Yohji watched his facial expression change from angry to upset.

"Okay. But I'm not leaving your side even for a second. We are doing this together, so don't get it in your head that you can ditch me part way, even if I have to drag you into the same bathroom stall with me."

Aya snorted at that, making Yohji grin from ear to ear.

"Now lets say we get into bed and think about the details later," Yohji led him back toward the soft bed, glad that Aya was finally relaxing. He hated making the man upset, but sometimes there was no way of getting around it if he was going to pry any information out of him.

Aya settled back in against him, his body so chilled that Yohji started to shiver as he yanked the blankets over them.

He wrapped his arms tightly around Aya, warming the man up against his chest. He deposited a light kiss to Aya's forehead before relaxing and letting sleep take him.

Author's notes: Finally the two can work together.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"We're taking my car," Aya grabbed Yohji's arm and led him toward the Porsche. There was no way he was letting Yohji drive.

"What's wrong with mine?" Yohji was trying not to grin at him.

"it's a piece of shit. I'm not…" Aya paused when Yohji's hand grabbed his, linking their fingers together. He hoped Yohji could stay focused enough to help him find Schwartz. If Yohji got distracted Aya was going to kick him out of the car. He didn't have time for mushy bullshit.

"it's a nice car," Yohji defended. It was. Aya just didn't like riding in anyone else's car because that meant he might not be able to drive. He didn't like someone else having control over where they went.

"Should we get you a helmet?" Yohji snickered. Aya's wounds had all healed over, even the worst of them. The stitches had all come out, but there were ragged scars in their place. He wanted to punch Yohji for that comment.

Aya was doing much better. His migraines were few and far between, he barely needed the aspirin that Yohji insisted on bringing with them all the time. He took a deep breath and ignored that comment.

"Any idea where to start looking?" Aya really had no leads. All he knew was that whenever Schwartz wanted to be found, and for some reason they always seemed to want Aya to find them, they would suddenly show up. They weren't stupid, they weren't about to attack the team when they had all their members, so the best bet was to just leave with Yohji. Truth be told he'd been hoping he could go alone, but after what happened last time he found himself glad that Yohji was in the car with him.

Aya didn't answer Yohji's question, just sped the car out of the garage. He knew Yohji was frustrated. This was promising already. Aya knew Yohji wasn't doing it purposely to piss him off, but the blonde lit a cigarette, thinking that blowing the smoke out the window helped any. The cigarette was still in the car, making Aya feel nauseous.

"You have two seconds," Aya warned him, nearly hitting another car when he turned to glare at Yohji.

"Asshole!" the man from the other car screamed. Aya knew that it wasn't the smart thing to do, but he did a U turn to follow the jerk that had screamed at him. The man couldn't stay in that car forever, and once he parked Aya was going to beat the hell out of him.

"Aya, don't do that!" Yohji gripped his thigh, trying to get through to him.

"Do you want to find Schwartz or end up spending the night with the police?" Before Aya could react Yohji reached over and put the car in park so fast that Aya hit the steering wheel.

Aya had at least caught himself before he would've gotten smashed in the face. Yohji wasn't so lucky. Even though the blonde had known what he was doing, that didn't stop him from shooting forward into the dashboard.

He reached over and gave Yohji a light shake. Shit, he wasn't responding.

Aya pulled out his cell phone and dialled Ken. He rolled his eyes at Ken's 'wow, gone five minutes and one of you is already hurt, eh?' he would throttle the little bastard if he didn't come over and help him with Yohji.

"Just come and help me check him over to see how bad it is." Aya snapped, hanging up.

He wasn't sure what he should be doing. Should he call an ambulance? Should he leave Yohji in Ken's care and go and find Schwartz himself?

No, that was stupid. He'd already learned the hard way about approaching Schwartz by himself.

He was going to beat the hell out of Yohji when the man woke. Why would he do something that stupid? Okay, Aya supposed his reason was a good one, but even so. He should've grabbed the wheel, not slammed them to a stop.

A rush of relief swept through him when Yohji sat back in his seat with a groan.

"He's fine now," Aya snapped into the phone before hanging up on Ken. He reached over and touched Yohji's forehead where a small line of blood dripped.

"Idiot," Aya sighed when Yohji's eyes slid open.

"If we survive this trip you're going to anger management!" Yohji growled, leaning in and kissing the side of Aya's neck while Aya started driving again.

"Gonna kiss it better?" Yohji asked, adding another kiss to Aya's neck.

"You're a big boy, Yohji!" Aya growled, speeding through traffic.

"Be nice, I think I dislocated my jaw for Godsake!" Yohji couldn't be serious. Even he couldn't be that stupid.

"If only," Aya shoved Yohji back into his own seat. He wasn't about to crash the car just because Yohji was getting frisky.

Aya swerved the car with shock when Yohji's hand started undoing the button of his pants.

"Are you insane!" Aya smacked his hand away.

"You hurt me, so I deserve to have you in the car!" Yohji was pouting at him, actually pouting! Did the man have no shame?

"You hurt yourself, moron!" Aya shoved him back into his own seat again.

"Only to stop you from going all 'mission' on a little man in a little car with a big mouth. You looked like you were going to murder him. Might I remind you that you were the one who almost hit his car, not the other way around." Yohji was right, Aya knew that, but there was no way in hell he was going to admit to it.

Aya let Yohji take his hand and link their fingers together. It was a comfort, actually, after seeing Yohji smash himself on the dash. He'd expected the blonde to have a broken nose or something, but instead he just had a scratch that was forming a bit of a bump on his forehead.

Aya pulled over to examine the cut. Yohji winced when Aya touched the cut. Aya reached into the glove compartment and pulled out his first aid kit.

"How bad is it?" Yohji asked. Aya ignored him, threading a sterile needle with dissolving stitches.

"Put your head back." Aya ordered. Yohji did as he was told. Aya went up on his knees to get leverage. It was easier to see the wound this way. He paused to swat Yohji's hands away from his ass before he started stitching.

"Ow! Shit, I think you're doing it too tight, it hurts like…"

"Quit being a baby." Aya tied off the stitches and cut the thread, pausing to look at his handiwork.

"If it were your face getting Frankenstein stitches you'd be bitching too!" Yohji was looking at himself in the mirror.

Aya shook his head. There was only one way to get Yohji to quit bickering about his beautiful face, but Aya wasn't about to give it to him just yet. They'd only been driving for twenty minutes, they weren't stopping anywhere just yet.

"Aya, be honest, how bad does it look?"

"You look deformed. Now quit bitching."

Author's notes: Okay, so I was thinking, if Aya and Yohji were stuck together in a car for any length of time, what would happen? Well, they'd probably argue most of the time. LOL! I'm having fun with this one.

Thanks Ranma for your review. I`m glad you still like it. :)


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Yohji hated being in Aya's car. The man drove like a maniac, for one. And now he had to hang his head out the window like a dog just to smoke, because Aya had freaked on him five times now and refused to pull over for a smoke break.

So hear Yohji was, half his torso out the window to smoke and Aya was still glaring about it.

"Can we find a motel soon?" Yohji asked, tossing the butt out onto the road before sliding his body back down into the seat.

"I already told you that we aren't stopping. Sleep in the backseat if you need to," Aya reached over and yanked Yohji's seatbelt down, buckling it.

"Thanks for caring, Aya," Yohji snickered, knowing full well that Aya only fixed his seatbelt to avoid a parking ticket or having Yohji become a liability to his 'mission' if he got hurt.

"I don't care," Aya said in an obvious lie that made Yohji smirk. Guy had to be so damned difficult.

"Hey, look! Its Mastermind!" Yohji shouted.

Aya slammed on the breaks. Yohji actually felt bad when he saw Aya looking back and forth, all predator.

"Which way did he go?" Aya looked pointedly at him.

"Um, heh!" Yohji scratched the back of his head. Should he fess up that he was just screwing with Aya now because the guy had been a jerk for eight hours now?

No, that would be really stupid. No sense in getting in a real fight with Aya right now.

"I thought it was that car over there, but maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me. I'm so damned tired." Yohji hoped to hell that he bought it.

Aya just nodded at him, starting the car back up. Yohji was just glad they hadn't gotten in an accident. As it was other people were honking their horns and screaming at them.

"I hope this isn't a trend with your driving, Aya, because I so don't want to die. I'm too pretty," Yohji didn't need to look to know Aya was glaring at him. He could feel it.

He reached over to one of Aya's hands, prying it away from the wheel to link with his own. Aya couldn't drive with two hands, so Yohji was pretty sure that taking one of them off the wheel wasn't going to make much difference. Aya could pull his hand away if he needed to.

"Aya, can we please get a real place to sleep? If I'm starting to see Mastermind, and I'm not nearly as tired as you look, then we're going to die if we don't sleep. I don't want you chasing after some guy just because he has the same hair colour or something. Besides, sleeping isn't any fun when you have to sleep alone."

Yohji exhaled a relieved breath when Aya finally conceded and pulled over into a hotel. He hadn't been expecting something more than a cheesy bug infested place, but then again, he knew how anal Aya was about cleanliness. He would have to count his lucky stars for that, because they were going to have a nice comfortable bed to sleep on.

"Will that be one room or…"

"One," Aya cut the man off, looking impatient. Where the man couldn't see Yohji linked his fingers with Aya's. He knew how the man was about public displays of affection.

"The only room with two beds we have left is…"

"One bed," Aya interrupted again. Yohji grinned from ear to ear. Well, that was way more than he had expected. He had sort of expected Aya to refuse letting anyone know about them who didn't already know.

"Not a word," Aya warned a split second before Yohji was going to lean in and whisper in his ear. Of course he had wanted to whisper something that would make Aya shiver. He wanted Aya to be hot and bothered in front of this guy. It was like a game. He'd been bored for the past two hours. Aya had barely said a word to him, so intent on Schwartz.

Yohji decided to ignore Aya's warning and lean in anyway.

"Do you have any idea what I want to do to you right now?" Yohji whispered so quietly that he was sure that Aya was the only one that heard. Yohji watched the telltale stiffening of Aya's back. The man could try to fight his desire all he wanted, it always beat him in the end anyway.

Where no one else could see Yohji moved their linked hands so that he could brush his fingers against Aya's leather clad hard on.

He grinned from ear to ear when Aya shivered.

"Aya, Ken said to call and check in at midnight. That means we have an hour to kill before we have to call 'mommy'." Yohji reminded him, wanting the clerk to think he was the one being level headed and wondering what the hell was wrong with Aya.

"Room 189, fifteenth floor," Aya accepted the keycard. Yohji didn't like the look he was getting. Crap, that meant Aya was getting a handle on his desire and was settling for pissed off.

"Make yourself useful and grab our bags. I'll see you upstairs." Aya growled, bumping shoulders with him as he walked by.

"uh huh, as long as you promise to let me in afterward."

"Do as you're told." Okay, now Yohji felt even more like a dog.

Then it dawned on him. Smoke break! That's exactly what that was! So Aya wasn't being a total asshole, he just didn't want to smell Yohji's cigarette smoke.

Either that or Aya really was just being an ass. It was hard to tell sometimes.

Author's notes: Thanks Bat and chinchan for your reviews. =)


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Aya hung up on Ken. All he had to do was treat it like a mission and Kritiker wouldn't bother them.

Aya frowned at the closed bathroom door. Yohji had been in there forever. Didn't the man know that Aya would obviously like a shower as well?

He came closer to the door, there was no water running. So what the hell was the man doing? Sleeping in there?

Aya, ready to barge through the door, found it unlocked. Something was up. He grabbed his sword, ready for anything as he slowly nudged the door open.

"About time you came in," Yohji's sultry voice greeted him. Aya raised an eyebrow at the bubble bath Yohji was lounging in.

"It only took you what, half an hour? If you'd needed that sword I would probably already be dead, I mean I can't exactly shower wearing my watch, right?" Yohji was laughing at him, lifting his foot and kicking some water toward him.

"Will you get in already? I'm going to have to add more hot water as it is. You took too long," Yohji was talking to him like he had known what he'd been passing up.

Aya glared at him for laughing, but started to undress regardless. Yohji looked too damned good in that tub, and Aya couldn't resist climbing in with him.

"Don't get too used to this," Aya warned, climbing into the water. Yohji grabbed onto him the second he was in the water and yanked him up against his chest.

"Doesn't mean I'm not going to enjoy it," Yohji kissed the side of his neck, dragging his teeth along the skin just enough to make Aya squirm.

"What did Ken have to say?" Aya reached forward to turn the hot water taps on, the water was warm at best. If they were going to spend any time in here they needed to heat up the water again.

"That he couldn't believe we were really going through with this, and then he asked how much we were fighting. I didn't answer to either. I just gave him the report and hung up. If I wanted a mother I'd…" he paused, what would he do? He supposed he'd never thought about that before.

"Aya, quit turning everything into a brooding session. The bath was meant to calm your nerves, not put you in your own head. Its a dark and scary place in there you know. I bet your inner child is still hiding under the bed," Yohji linked their hands together to let Aya know he was mostly joking.

"Seriously though, Aya, you need to loosen up a bit." Once Aya turned the water back off Yohji was already drawing him back against his chest.

"I've already done that once, remember?"

"That was amnesia, that was totally different. And, for the record, you didn't loosen up, you just got kind of emotional for a bit, and then you sort of went batty for a bit. Honestly, tell me the first thing that comes to your mind right this second," Yohji's voice was muffled a little by the kisses he was depositing on Aya's neck.

"I think we should visit that little rat Nagi's website tomorrow and see if he's left any hints. We need to figure out where they…"

"Aya, that's exactly what I'm talking about. Can't talk for five minutes without it turning into some sort of mission."

"That bothers you?" Aya felt his entire body tense at the idea. Did he expect Aya to become some fragile little boy for him? Is that what he thought? That he could turn Aya into one of those _things_ that he brought home from bars?

"Not for the reasons that you are obviously thinking about right now. You are so easy to read. I love you for your strength, I love your abilities, but those things don't make you happy, they just give you purpose. I want there to be one thing that makes you happy where you don't have to think about missions for every five minutes. I don't expect my company to make you not think about missions. I'm your team mate, so no matter where we go in life we will always remember the missions. But what do you do for fun?"

"My sword…"

"Mission," Yohji reminded him. Okay, that was true. Every time he thrust his sword, even when practicing, he could see the blood.

"Reading," Aya shrugged. That was the only thing he could think of. I mean even his dreams were plagued with missions. But there was a reason for that.

"After all the lives we've taken we don't deserve a moment's peace."

"Uh huh, Okay. What about looking at…okay, never mind, I forgot, you don't look at anyone. Hell, you barely look at me half the time," Yohji's voice betrayed the feeling behind it. He obviously hadn't really expected that bit to fly out.

"Because you'd get cocky about it. But that doesn't mean I don't look," Aya conceded.

"I wish they would just go back to one of their old places so that we could kick in the door and slam their heads in it," Yohji snorted.

"We will check the website in the morning."

"So we're back to calling on Omi, eh?"

"Not exactly," Aya had to smirk this time, tilting his head back to look at Yohji.

"Tell me you didn't steal the kid's laptop…you did! Oh my God, when he freaks out, I'm not going to be the one on the phone with him. That's going to be you on the burner this time."

"Omi knows by now not to yell at me," Aya would just hang up if the Chibi even thought about it.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Yohji grinned as he watched Aya look through the files Nagi had put on his computer. Yohji was sitting on top of the table.

His goal was to see how long it would take for Aya to either get mad or get excited. He started by playing his bare toes over Aya's leg. A wide grin stretched across his face when Aya shoved his leg away.

"Aya," Yohji put on his best sultry voice. Aya never refused him when he used this voice. He watched Aya's eyes narrow as the man tried to concentrate on the task at hand.

Yohji ran his toes up Aya's thigh, only to get the same reaction.

Okay, so no toes were going to get near his goal. Well, it might piss him off, but it would take too long.

He reached over and slid one of Aya's eartails behind his ear, skimming his fingers over Aya's cheek in the process.

Aya slapped his hand away, harder than he had with the foot.

He used his toes again this time, touching them to Aya's chest. This time he got a charley horse punched into his leg for his efforts. _That freaking hurt!_

"Keep your dirty feet off me, Kudou," Aya snapped.

"My feet are clean. You and I just bathed for half an hour, I'm pretty sure I'm clean by now." Yohji snickered.

"Even clean feet smell." Yohji was pretty sure his feet didn't smell at all right now. He lightly kicked Aya's chest, yanking his leg away just in time to miss another hit.

"Do you mind! I am fucking busy!" Aya screamed, shoving him off the table to land on his ass.

Yohji lay there for a second. _That really hurt! _He hadn't expected Aya to go that far.

"Keep your hands and feet to yourself! If you can't be serious about this then go fucking home!" Aya was on his feet. Yohji let him drag him to his feet by his shirt.

"What do you really expect to find on there, Aya? Maybe they don't even know yet that we're trying to find them?" Yohji lay his hand against Aya's cheek, tracing his thumb over Aya's bottom lip.

"I don't know," Aya released him so quickly that Yohji almost fell.

"Well, lets do this my way then," Yohji stole Aya's seat at the computer and clicked on the 'message' button.

_Dear Schwartz. Are you pussies really hiding from us? Afraid of two kittens? Wow, your life must be pretty sad. PS. I bet Farfarello wants another shot at Aya. What do you say you quit being fucking cowards and show your faces._

Yohji hit the 'send' button. If Schwartz didn't answer to that challenge then they wouldn't answer to any.

"What the hell did you just write?" Aya snarled.

"I wrote 'hello, my dear lady, want to get dirty?'" Yohji snickered.

"No, I mean I know what you wrote, but do you really think they're going to answer to something so tasteless? I mean really? Just because you were rude doesn't mean they are going to show up on the doorstep."

"Yeah, actually, it really does. Are you saying that if someone wrote that to you that you wouldn't go and find them, Mr. Road rage? You couldn't even turn down a challenge when the near-collision was your own damned fault. Just be glad you have me with you. I am probably your best bet at finding those assholes. Now come here, I want to screw your brains out," Yohji grabbed Aya by the shoulders and yanked him into his arms, biting onto Aya's shoulder hard enough to make the man shudder.

"What do you say we leave our DNA all over this damned place." Yohji kept kissing the pale flesh as he started working on the fly to Aya's pants.

"You're a real romantic, you know that?" Aya was laughing at him. That was a good sign, it meant the man wasn't stressing out or getting depressed over the small details.

"I think we should make use of this room until checkout time, that's eleven, right? Then we'll head back to the car and work on this mission you're so hellbent on carrying out." Aya nodded, depositing kisses of his own onto Yohji's neck.

Yohji grasped his member and started to stroke. He'd started to learn that if he made Aya come multiple times in one bout of lovemaking that he wasn't as much of a bed beast as usual. I mean Yohji had legendary stamina, but Aya…well, it seemed like twenty odd years of being a virgin made Aya want to make up for lost time every day. Yohji's body could only take so much of that.

Aya gasped into his ear and Yohji squeezed a bit tighter, just enough to put the man on edge.

"Yohji, I…"

"I know, Aya, just let it all go. Let all the stress go, and make it just you and me, even for this little while."

He kissed Aya full on the mouth, stealing the breath from his lungs. Aya was undulating in his arms, making Yohji hard as a rock. God, but that man was freaking sexy. He bet Aya had no idea how hot he was. The man didn't seem to look in the mirror other than when he quickly ran a brush through his hair. He didn't even look at his reflection in windows.

He was pretty sure that Aya was reminded of the people he killed every time he looked in the mirror. The man seemed to find the smallest thoughts painful while his body could put up with way more damage than anyone should have to endure and still stand.

Yohji tightened his arm around Aya's back, holding him in hard, refusing to let up on the kiss that made Aya pant into his mouth.

"Come for me, Aya," he whispered against his lips. He could feel how close Aya was before the man came hard.

He turned Aya around and shoved him against the wall, pressing up against his back while sliding his pants down further.

"I'm going to take you now, any objections?" Yohji knew Aya liked it when he was rough no matter what he did, but he always wanted to make sure that he wasn't forcing anything on him.

Aya didn't answer, which was an answer in itself. Yohji freed himself from his leather pants and shoved his way into Aya's prone body. The redhead gasped, his head falling back against Yohji's shoulder, which had to be uncomfortable when Yohji kept his hands pinned to the wall over his head.

He started out slowly, making sure that Aya's body adjusted to him before he quickened his pace. Aya was gasping and panting, and groaning loud enough that anyone out in the hall probably heard him. Now that he had a steady rhythm he reached around Aya's hips and grasped him again, pumping in time with his thrusts until Aya came again.

"how's that for a good morning," Yohji grinned, sliding out from his body. He quickly cleaned them both off with the hotel's tissues and tossed them in the garbage.

Aya pulled his pants up and went back to the computer. That man was impossible!

Thank you grisMori for your review. J


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Aya kept his eyes glued to the road, watching every single car that went by. Yohji was hellbent on distracting him. He'd shoved Yohji away three times already to keep the man from dipping his head down into his lap to get him off.

"Aya, I want to taste you," Yohji whispered in his ear. Aya shoved him off again. He wasn't going to give in. He'd probably crash if he let Yohji do _that_.

"You'll get over it," Aya insisted. Yohji pouted, _actually pouted _at him. Aya shook his head. The man could be a handful.

Aya's car came to a dead stop, the engine rumbling.

"Aya, what the hell? Quit stopping in the middle of traffic…" they were suddenly T-boned by a white Cadillac. Aya's Porsche spun from the impact. The seatbelt jerked Aya backward so hard he choked. What the hell? He knew for a fact that he hadn't been the cause of the accident. He'd still had his foot on the gas.

"Aya, you okay?" Yohji asked, his voice hoarse. Aya nodded, unbuckling his seatbelt so that he could look Yohji over. The man didn't seem too injured.

"Broken bones?" Aya asked. His own body ached all over, and he was pretty sure that other than his arm out of its socket there wasn't anything else wrong with him.

"Nope, you?" Yohji asked. Aya reached over with his useful hand and unbuckled Yohji's seatbelt.

"What the hell just happened?" Yohji asked.

Aya used his good arm to position the bad one.

"On the count of three," Aya instructed. Yohji voiced an 'oh shit!' before he grabbed Aya's arm.

"One, two…" Yohji snapped his arm into place. Aya growled in pain. Yohji could've waited until he said three, that way Aya would've been ready.

Aya's head whipped around as his car door was ripped open.

"Are you boys okay?" A familiar voice asked. Aya swallowed hard. Nagi. The little bastard had made it so that the car had stalled.

"okay enough to kick your ass!" Yohji shouted, lunging out of his car door to run around toward Nagi.

"Now I wouldn't do that if I were you!" Nagi stepped closer. Aya didn't have his sword at hand. He was going to have to fight with fists. Aya aimed to clip him under the jaw, but Nagi dodged as easily as he could've if Aya were a child.

"I didn't appreciate the message you sent to us. So I thought I would come and see you myself."

Aya aimed a kick at him, but suddenly his head was fogged, random images forced their way into his brain, causing a massive headache that was so far beyond the ones he'd had after getting shot.

"Oh, I must've forgotten to mention that Shuldig was reading over my shoulder when I received your message." Nagi was smirking at them.

Aya thought of his own random images. He had to keep Shuldig out of his head as much as possible. The second Shuldig backed up clutching his head Aya backhanded Nagi as hard as he could, sending the kid sprawling across the asphalt.

He just barely dodged as Shuldig aimed a bullet in his direction. Yohji was there suddenly, grappling with Shuldig, struggling to get a hit in.

Aya kicked Nagi hard in the face, knocking him out. He rummaged through the backseat, grabbing his spare sword. He looked down at Nagi's prone form, positioning his sword over the kid's heart.

Something struck him hard in the back of his head, knocking him to the ground. He didn't have to look to know that it was Farfarello. The bastard always aimed for Aya's head first.

He should've known that the entire Schwartz team would show up at once. He wished he could've blamed Yohji for his lack of focus, but it was his own damned fault. He leapt to his feet and ducked before he even saw the foot aimed for his head.

He punched Farfarello in the stomach hard enough to make the man back up. He was grabbed from behind. Damn it! He couldn't take on both Farfarello and Crawford at the same time! And Yohji wouldn't be able to help him, he was too busy struggling with Shuldig.

The only thing he could do is kick Farfarello in the chest once Crawford lifted him right off the ground. He elbowed backward, but Crawford slammed him down onto the ground and grabbed him by the hair, smacking his head against the ground.

Aya's vision blurred, his body threatening to give out. Farfarello was on him suddenly, stabbing him in the stomach before kicking him under the chin. Aya held on to consciousness, but just barely. He could hear Yohji fighting, hear Yohji screaming his name.

They didn't stand a chance. Why the hell had he thought this was a good idea? He reached up and caught Farfarello's arms as the man crawled up his body and aimed his weapons for his eyes. Farfarello was grinning in his face while grinding his hips down against Aya. Shit, he wasn't about to end up a blind pet for the man. He turned and bucked at the same time, rolling until Farfarello was beneath him. The man was still grinning like a maniac as Aya started shoving his arms down to try to point the weapons at Farfarello instead.

Crawford booted him in the side of the head. Aya went down, everything fading to black.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Yohji blinked, where was he? He looked around. Brick walls all around. He ran his fingers through his hair as he sat up.

The last thing he remembered was fighting with Shuldig and then…he'd gotten distracted when Aya had screamed. He'd stolen a glance at Aya, who had been tag teamed by Crawford and Farfarello. He was out cold with blood running down his face.

That glance had cost him the fight. Shuldig had ripped through his mind and shot him in the chest at the same time.

He looked down at where the bullet had gone through. There were bandages. Aya was laying unresponsive a few feet away. Yohji was scared to see what the bandages around his head were hiding.

Aya groaned, turning onto his side. Yeah, he could understand why Aya would curl in on himself, the man had been stabbed through the stomach, that much he had seen. But if the stab in the stomach hadn't made him make much noise, what had made him scream.

"Aya?" Yohji crept toward him.

"hn," Aya answered, slowly climbing to his hands and knees. He watched one of Aya's hands, trembling, reached up to touch the bandages that Yohji still couldn't see. He wished Aya would turn to face him so that he could see the damage.

Aya's hand was touching over his left eye. That was where the bandages were. Shit!

Yohji raced to his side as he watched Aya start to yank at the bandages.

"Aya, stop it! Whatever they did to your face is going to bleed out if you pull off the bandages. Those freaks patched us up for some reason. I don't know what it is, but we have to be as strong as we can if we're going to fight. There's no sense in bleeding to death." Aya slapped his hands away when he tried to pull his hands from the bandages.

"You screamed and then passed out." Yohji tried to wrap his arms around Aya, but the man would have none of it.

"No, I passed out, then I screamed, and then I passed out again. Get your facts straight," Aya snarled. So that was how it went. Yohji mentally smacked himself for not having guessed that. There was no way Aya would've screamed if he was conscious.

"Well, whatever it was, just be glad you were out when they started doing it. At least you didn't have to watch them…"

"hn," okay, they were back to that again. Aya had given his answers and was back to practically ignoring him.

He winced at the wet sound as Aya pulled the gauze away from his bleeding socket.

"How bad is it?" Yohji couldn't bring himself to look, afraid of what he would see.

"Blind," Aya confirmed, looking at Yohji with the eye that still worked. Blood was still pouring from the wound, but Aya wasn't about to let him anywhere near it.

"cover it up, Aya. I don't want you to bleed to death," Yohji didn't know what to do. What assurances could he give, 'just be glad its just one and not both', that would be _real _sensitive. It would probably get him punched.

Yohji was surprised when Aya actually did as he said and slid the gauze back into place and re-bandaged it.

"Where are we?" Aya asked, looking Yohji over, which, Yohji knew, was to look for injuries.

"Sorry, babe, I lost consciousness shortly after you. Heard you scream and I actually fucking turned, and then Shuldig shot me. I know it was fucking stupid of me. I don't need you to call me a moron. I already know." Yohji felt like shit about it. If he had just been paying attention maybe he could've killed Shuldig and then maybe he could've tried to help Aya.

Aya kissed him, silencing him. Yohji wrapped his arms around Aya and pulled him closer, careful of the wound in Aya's stomach. Aya's arms wrapped around his neck. The kiss was desperate, like it was the only thing that was real. All the pain was momentarily forgotten, there was nothing but this.

Aya ended the kiss, but quickly buried his head in Yohji's neck. Yohji held him, not daring to push his luck and pull Aya into his lap. The man would flip even if it were under dire circumstances. No, when Aya was being emotional this was about as far as it went.

"Don't ever call me 'babe' again or I'll rip out your liver," Aya growled into his neck, but made no attempts to move.

"Duly noted," Yohji chuckled.

"Wow, you two are something else. Don't even know where you are and you two are making out?" Shuldig's voice filled the room a second before Yohji saw him. Aya made no moves, kept his head hidden in Yohji's neck.

"wait," Aya whispered. Yohji hoped to hell that Mastermind still couldn't read Aya's mind, because Yohji had no idea what the man was planning.

Aya leaned up and kissed him again. What the _hell_? What was Aya doing? Shuldig was standing right there! Why in the hell would Aya kiss him at a time like this?

Yohji followed suit. Aya had better have a good plan. Yohji kissed him back, cupping Aya's cheek, he followed Aya's frenzied kisses, returning the passion regardless of who was in the room.

"Very nice," Shuldig said, appreciating the view.

Yohji nearly jumped out of his skin when Aya palmed him through his leather pants, making his member come to life.

"Apparently Abyssinian likes to be watched," Shuldig laughed. Yohji glared at the man before going back to kissing Aya. He had no idea what the hell he should be doing right now. What he wanted to do was pull Aya into his lap and screw his brains out. Aya straddled him, and Yohji could feel him grin into the kiss. What the hell was going on? Had Aya lost his mind.

Yohji opened his eyes when he felt Aya's shoulder move. The man was shaking a finger at Shuldig to come over. Yohji did _not _want that freak joining in, no way!

"Well now, that I can do. I can see your thoughts, Abyssinian, and you really want this. And here I was thinking you were a pretty predictable creature." Shuldig laughed. Yohji wished he could pull away and tell Mastermind to fuck off and get his own lover, but Aya had to have a plan, right? He wasn't really going to let Shuldig join them, was he?

If he were going to relay a message to Yohji wouldn't he at least have his eyes open to express his intentions? Aya's eyes were closed. Shit!

Author's notes: Poor poor Yohji stuck out of the loop.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Aya hated leaving Yohji in the dark while doing something like this. He felt disgusting, but managed to only focus on how it felt to have Yohji's lips against his. He couldn't give him any hints, Shuldig would read it in his head before he could even get a hint to Yohji, and even if he didn't he would read the hint from Yohji anyway.

So Aya motioned Shuldig to come over and join them. The man laughed, but came over just as Aya had hoped he would. He wanted Yohji right now, wanted everything the man had to give. Yohji kissed down his jaw and then bit hard into the hollow between his shoulder and neck. Aya gasped, that always felt amazing.

He could feel Yohji's frustration, and he couldn't blame the man. He was pretty sure that if he opened his eyes Yohji would be glaring. Whether at him or Shuldig he really didn't know at this point.

He nearly jumped when Shuldig's hands slid over his shoulders. Aya turned his head, looking at the man, forcing himself to think on how beautiful the man really was instead of how much he wanted to murder him.

Aya knew for sure that the man was in his head, he could feel it like a buzzing in the back of his mind. _There's better places to put your hands! _

Shuldig laughed with surprise before sliding his hands down Aya's chest, leaning his chin on Aya's shoulder. Aya didn't have to look to know that he was trying to irritate Yohji.

"Grow up, both of you," Aya snapped, yanking Yohji in for a bruising kiss while Shuldig's hand reached between his legs.

Aya waited, feeling the exact moment that Shuldig was even a little off balance. Aya grabbed his arm and yanked as hard as he could, throwing him to the ground. He stomped on Shuldig's arm and jerked as hard as he could to pop it from its socket.

Yohji was at his side faster than he had expected, slamming his boot down onto Shuldig's neck and holding him.

Aya's eyes widened when he realized why Shuldig wasn't trying to rip through his mind. He was calling the other three. Shit!

Aya shoved Yohji back and grabbed Shuldig's other arm, pressing his boot onto Shuldig's head.

"Yohji, take my place," Aya ordered. It didn't matter the situation, Farfarello was going to come at him first, so he needed Yohji to hold Shuldig in place.

Aya ducked just in time to miss the boot to the head. The man seemed to come out of nowhere, laughing as he aimed another kick.

"You should be grateful to me, Abyssinian, he would've taken both your eyes had I not reigned him in," Crawford was grinning as he came down the stairs.

Aya so was not about to go thanking any of them. If Crawford hadn't helped knock him out then he wouldn't have lost consciousness long enough to lose that eye.

"Hey, Aya," Yohji called. Aya dodged one of Farfarello's daggers.

"Can't you see I'm busy!" Aya snapped, punching Farfarello under the chin, snapping his head back. The man fell, but not before slashing down Aya's arm with one of his daggers.

"Heh, yeah, but there's something here you might want to see." Was Yohji crazy? He didn't have time to look! He still had a psychopath trying to kill him.

"Shuldig was stupid enough to lose to us when he had a freaking gun in the back of his pants!" Yohji laughed, grabbing it.

"Fuck you both!" Shuldig snarled.

'Call off your dog, Crawford, or I'll kill Shuldig with his own stupid ass gun," Yohji was actually laughing. What an idiot!

"The gun won't do you any good," Nagi walked down the stairs. Okay, that plan was shot.

Yohji pulled the trigger anyway. Aya could hear it click, jammed.

"Yohji, dump the bullets!" Aya ordered. The gun was of no use to them, but he'd be damned if he'd make it of use to Schwartz.

"You two are outnumbered," Nagi said, like he needed to freaking remind them. Aya wished he could just kill everyone in the room, himself included, because they were all so fucking stupid! He had been stupid enough to think this would work, Yohji was stupid to shout out that he had a gun so that Nagi would have time to jam it. Shuldig was stupid for getting lured in that easily, and the rest of them could go to hell!

"Yohji, make your thoughts random. We're leaving, and we're taking Shuldig with us. If anyone gets in our way we'll break his neck. I don't think you're about to let your lover die that easily." Aya grabbed Farfarello and threw him as hard as he could toward Crawford. His intentions were clear. Reign him in or Shuldig dies.

"So fucking stupid!" Shuldig growled as Yohji hauled him up and positioned him so that he could drag him and snap his neck if necessary.

"That's right, you are stupid," Aya agreed. He had known his plan had been a long shot, and he really couldn't have expected it to go any better. Question was what the hell were they going to do with Shuldig?

"Nice Cadillac, trying to overcompensate for something?" Yohji snickered. Aya helped him shove Shuldig into the backseat, wrestling with him until he had the man subdued, once again, in a -ready to break your neck-position while Shuldig screamed curses at him. Yohji was fast at work in the front seat hotwiring the car.

"Quit bitching," Aya growled. The man was as impossible as Yohji, shouting whenever he was mad like a two year old.

Aya almost lost his grip when Yohji floored it, sending him crashing down onto Shuldig.

"Heavy bastard!" Shuldig hissed when Aya's weight settled on his lower back. The way Yohji was driving he was going to have to be as secure as he could.

"I would watch what you say to Aya, he might not say as much, but if you piss him off I so am not going to try to save your life."

"You won't get far!" Shuldig snorted. Aya tightened his hand around Shuldig's neck, stretching it to the left, just enough to let Shuldig feel the pressure. The man went silent, eyes scrunched shut. Aya tightened his grip even further when Shuldig tried to slip into his mind.

"Heh, you're still trying to mind-fuck us, eh? Aya will kill you. Keep pushing him and I can guarantee that your pain won't last long at all. Oh, and if you're doing some damsel in distress shit to that eight ball you call a boyfriend you'd better can it. Screaming like a little bitch won't do you any good." Aya rolled his eyes, Yohji was enjoying himself a little too much. Aya supposed he was entitled after what he had put him through with that little make out scene.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Yohji grinned at Shuldig. The man looked pissed beyond belief after Aya had bolted a chair to the floor and tied him to it with rawhide. Yohji knew that the man must be in pain from the bonds.

"At least give a guy a smoke," Shuldig smirked, looking for all the world like he was the one that had won this round.

"Shut up," Aya snarled, obviously having had it with Shuldig's bitching the entire time.

"What are we going to do with him, though? I mean other than kick the shit out of him," Ken was grinning. Kritiker had guards all over the damned place, hiding in plain sight as customers and various other positions.

"Eventually he's going to have to take a piss," Ken pointed out. He was right, of course. They might kill the man, but they weren't about to take all of his dignity away. Or at least that was the way Aya was acting. Yohji would love to see the man piss himself. But then again the smell would be atrocious after a few days.

Yohji grinned suddenly. He'd given Aya something as a gag gift, joking that he wouldn't be able to run away ever again. Aya had rolled his eyes, but he had kept it!

"Aya, I need to go into your room just this once to grab something. Will you kill me?" Yohji knew full well that Aya might throw a fit just for him mentioning going into his room.

"Fine!" Aya snapped. The warning was clear. You can grab whatever it is you need, but don't screw with his things.

Yohji laughed as he ran up the stairs. This was going to be awesome, especially because he had a friend tamper with it so that the wearer couldn't get it off. He'd bought it for Aya, but he'd known that they might actually need it sometime.

He slipped into Aya's room, feeling like he was defiling a temple just by turning on the light. It was there, sitting on Aya's dresser. The man probably had no idea what he should do with it. If Aya wasn't so proper all the time Yohji was pretty sure he would've thrown it out.

He grabbed the collar and ran down the stairs, cackling the whole way. Oh this was too much!

A small tug at the corner of Aya's' mouth was all the smile he got, but on Aya it might as well have been a full out laugh.

Aya, knowing what he had in mind grabbed Shuldig's head and held it in place.

"Oh, hell no!" Shuldig shouted, struggling hard against his bonds. Yohji snapped the collar onto him.

"Omi, be a good boy and turn on the sensors. He won't be going anywhere. We can untie him now."

"I'm going to kill every last one of you!" Shuldig snarled. Aya was fast at work, untying Mastermind.

"I will not wear a fucking shock collar!" Shuldig screamed.

Ken punched him hard in the mouth, just for the hell of it. Yohji grinned watching Shuldig struggle to get the collar off.

"Yeah, only we can get that off you. My friends tampered with it so that you need a code to get it off. They also made it so that the shock is so painful its disabling. I got it for Aya as a gag gift, but I also figured we might need it one day." Yohji grabbed Shuldig's arm and helped him up. That was about as charitable as he was going to get.

"You stole Aya away and made him hate us, you trapped us in a basement and let that freak cut out Aya's eye. I think a little shock collar is pretty minor compared to the shit you pulled." Yohji reminded him, reaching into his pocket for a cigarette.

"The shop opens in half an hour. Who's going to baby-sit him?" Yohji reminded, lighting his cigarette and blowing the smoke in Shuldig's face. Maybe it was just the sympathy for a fellow smoker, but he'd give Shuldig his second hand smoke.

"How long you kitties think you can hold me here before Schwartz comes and kicks the shit out of you? Want to lose the other eye, Abyssinian? Or how about you, you vain idiot, you want your pretty face all cut up?" He was leering at Yohji.

"Well fuck you too. And here I was giving you some sympathy." Yohji reached over and slid his fingers into Aya's. The swordsman pulled away, refusing to look at him. What had he done wrong?

"Aya?" Yohji wouldn't be ignored just because they were in front of the enemy. He thought they were beyond this!

"Aya!" Yohji repeated, grabbing the man's arm. Aya turned to face him, his eye looking sad.

"What's wrong?" Yohji pulled him aside, not about to talk in front of Mastermind even if the guy could hear them in the hall.

"Am I going to be useful in missions? My vision is cut in half. I have one hell of a blind spot, Yohji. I won't see anyone coming from the left! I won't be able to back you up anymore!" Aya hissed. Yohji pulled him into his arms, tucking Aya's head under his chin. Aya hated being vulnerable like this, but he had started accepting Yohji's comfort bit by bit. It had taken a while, but they were at the point where, in private, Aya would let Yohji hold him.

"It'll be fine. You adjust to things way faster than anyone I know. Give it a week and you'll be so used to seeing out of one eye that everything else will be like second nature." Yohji didn't have to lie or sugar coat anything. He knew that everything would be alright. Aya had, after all, subdued Shuldig with one eye and a stab wound to the stomach. He really didn't need any more proof, did he?

"I hope you're right," Aya whispered so quietly that Yohji almost missed it. Now the real question was, what the hell were they going to do with Shuldig? They couldn't very well let the man run around the apartments, he'd find a weapon and try to kill them. The only solution was to keep him under watch. It should be Yohji and Aya watching him. Ken would get carried away and beat the shit out of him, but then leave an opening for him to return the favour. Omi wasn't good at hand to hand combat. The only ones strong enough to take him down were the two of them.

This was going to be hell!


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

"So, what's the plan?" Shuldig came over to him, leaning on his shoulder. Aya elbowed him hard in the gut. He'd just had to abandon his cooking for a moment to take that asshole to the bathroom, he didn't want the man hindering him any longer, and he sure as hell didn't want him leaning on him. He was half tempted to let Ken play with the man some more. Ken not only had him black and blue from punches and kicks, but the boy had decided it was fun to keep throwing the man to the perimeter where the collar would shock the hell out of him. Ken and Omi had made a strange game out of it. Whomever threw him the most times, while Mastermind tried to run away, won. Yohji had been score keeper. Children, all of them!

"Don't be all pissy, you're the one keeping _me_, remember? I just want to know why," Shuldig grinned as he stood up straight.

"Reason?" Aya pretended he had no idea what Mastermind meant. He'd been doing a damned fine job of keeping the guy out of his head.

"You cooking again, Aya?" Yohji asked, shoving past Shuldig to wrap his arms around Aya's waist from behind.

"hn," Aya didn't like answering stupid questions. If the idiot would open both his eyes he could see clearly that he was cooking.

"You cooking for fucktard there, too?" Yohji asked. Aya shook his head. No, he wasn't.

"I told Ken that he could cook for Shuldig. That boy is happy to get anyone to eat his food, friend or enemy. My food is too good for him."

"Now that's not very nice, Abyssinian, Crawford cooked for you while you were in our possession," Shuldig reminded him.

"And you screwed up my memories, helped a psychopath steal me, made me hate the ones that I love, nearly got me…Farfarello cut out my eye." he didn't even want to voice what Farfarello had almost done to him that day. If Yohji hadn't shown up he would've been raped by that sadist.

"I see, so this is a grudge. But you are feeding me, nonetheless, I suppose a mediocre cook is better than starving." Shuldig shrugged, hopping up onto the counter.

Aya moved away from Yohji to grab another pan to start frying the vegetables he'd cut up. While moving back to the stove he smacked the pan hard against Shuldig's knee.

"Off the counter!" Aya barked at him.

"You fucking broke it, you asshole!" Shuldig screamed at him. Shulidg cussed as he hobbled over to a chair. Aya was pretty sure he had split the bone. He felt a smile tugging at his lips.

"Did you really break it?" Yohji asked, looking from one redhead to the next.

"No, I just like to fucking scream that for shits and giggles! He broke the bone, you jerk! Now get me a splint!" Shuldig roared at him.

"Aya?" Yohji ignored the screaming Mastermind.

"If you feel you must then go and make him a splint. What an annoyance," Aya sighed. If it would get Shuldig to shut up then it was fine.

"Oh, and by the way, Ken's not a mediocre cook. He's out barbecuing in the back."

"What, hotdogs compared to this gourmet feast you're making in here? That's cold," Shuldig growled.

"Ken can barbecue?" Yohji asked. He didn't even know they had one of those.

"He's never used one before. He saw it the other day and decided to buy it so that he could experiment with new equipment. I told him it was a waste of money, but he just had to have it," Aya threw his hands up in the air. No one ever listened to him when it came to their finances. If they did Yohji would save a ton of money just by quitting smoking, and Ken could limit the monstrosities he cooked, Omi could quit buying gadgets that flashed and made music and every other stupid thing the kid bought.

"So I'm a test experiment, now?" Shuldig had his pant leg rolled up finally, groaning as he straightened his leg out.

"You will find out what we are going to do with you after you eat every bite of what Ken provides for you." Aya assured. And he meant it. He would show Shuldig what his purpose was.

Aya stretched his arms up over his head, before going back to stirring the vegetables into the meat and noodles. He had taken things that he loved and mixed them together without a recipe, just smelling things and deciding what would go well together. It was watching him do this one morning that had given Ken the idea to start doing it as well. Of course Ken hadn't had any knowledge of the kitchen at all when he'd started, and it didn't seem to have gotten any better over the years, either. He was just glad when Ken had given the 'dinner meets dessert' combinations that he'd been trying to create for a couple months. Smelling that shit in the kitchen was sickening to say the least.

"Hey, Shuldig, Aya said I got to cook for you! After kicking you around before I guess I should at least make dinner for you, right?" Ken placed a plate of…something glowing green in front of Shuldig, who's eyes widened comically.

"How the hell is this shit green? Is it alive?" Shuldig poked at the sludgy green mass on his plate.

"Oh, well, I didn't like how dark it looked, so I added green food colouring, for presentation and all. I mean some of the best foods don't look tasty, but that didn't mean I had to let it go completely. Dig in!" Ken looked so excited. Shuldig stared at it incredulously.

"You can't be serious!" Shuldig shouted.

Aya slammed the cutting knife into the table centimetres away from Shuldig's fingers hard enough to make it stay in the table. The order was clear EAT YOUR FUCKING FOOD! Aya felt Omi's presence just outside the door, watching while shaking his head.

Yohji walked back into the room holding the bandages and wood to splint the leg and burst out laughing at the monstrosity on Shuldig's plate.

"Make sure you thank him. He's going out of his way for you. If you insult his cooking all bets are off and I'm going to kill you," Omi chimed in, startling Shuldig. The boy was smiling like he would if he had just said something nice to the man.

"A feast fit for a king, Ken, you outdid yourself this time!" Yohji cheered. Aya gave Yohji a wink that he was sure no one else noticed.

He watched Shuldig out of the corner of his eye, making sure the man really ate every bite, even though he knew that the other three were making sure of the same thing. Shuldig had gagged a few times. Yohji was finished splinting his leg long before the man finished eating.

"You promised you'd tell me why I'm here," Shuldig reminded him.

Aya came up behind him and grabbed a hold of Shuldig's chin and wrenched his head to the side with a crunch.

"What the hell, Aya! If you were just going to kill him why did you make me splint his leg? Why make Ken cook for him?" Yohji was shouting.

"I think every man deserves a last meal, one that reflects everything he's done in life. I think Shuldig spent a lot of time doing…interesting things, so he deserved an 'interesting' meal. As for the splint? I wanted to make sure he ate every bite, so in order to get him to do that I had to make sure there was no doubt in his mind that he was going to survive."

Author's notes: Sorry, Shuldig lovers, he's dead. I bet you all hate me now, LOL! I actually really like all of Schwartz, but what the story warrants I give. J I can't exactly have everyone hold hands and sing together in the end, so onward with the story!

thanks bat for your review. :)**  
**


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Yohji shook his head. Well, that had been fun while it lasted. Shuldig had gotten what he deserved as far as Yohji was concerned. Kritiker had sent someone to collect the body, knowing that they couldn't split up Weiss while Schwartz was probably on the way. So all they could do right now was wait.

Aya seemed to be taking that quite literally, as he paced back and forth in front of the window, clutching with his sword in hand.

"Aya, give it a rest. They'll come when they come!" Yohji grabbed him from behind and held tight, stopping him from pacing.

Aya went dead silent. Okay, bad sign. There was Aya's usual silence, and then there was the silence that was so thick in the air that Yohji knew he would be in danger if he didn't come up with something fast.

"You're going to wear yourself out and then you won't be in top shape when they do show up!" not the best cover, but he did feel Aya start to relax a bit. Knowing that he wasn't in danger of being killed anymore, Yohji let go.

Aya glared at him, but walked over and sat down at the table and started drumming his fingernails against the wood. Yohji was going to kill the man!

Okay, maybe Aya wasn't the only one who was on edge. He took a deep breath and sat down across from Aya, taking Aya's hands in his.

"Aya, its almost five, Ken and Omi should be waking up soon, so you and I are going to bed. I won't take no for an answer, you're going to bed and you're going to sleep even if I have to drag you and knock you out," Yohji winked at him. Aya's lips thinned to a straight line. That wasn't good.

"Aya, what good are you going to be if they decide to attack tomorrow? Who says they're coming tonight? If they bust down that door tomorrow and you're on nothing but adrenaline will you run out of steam when that freak comes at you again? Or will you lose your other eye?" Yohji knew that was a low blow, but it was the only thing that might get through that thick skull.

Aya pulled his hands away and started drumming them on the table again.

"Okay, lets compromise. We won't go to bed, we'll sleep on the couch so that if they do attack Ken and Omi won't be the only ones down here." Yohji nearly choked when Aya nodded, agreeing. _Thank God! _Yohji needed sleep as bad as Aya did, but there was no way he was going to sleep knowing that Aya was awake and worried.

"Mornin'," Ken mumbled, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes even though he was already showered and dressed. He looked exhausted. Omi, on the other hand, was as bright and sunny as ever.

"Omi keep you busy all night?" Yohji asked with a grin.

"No, we…uh, I…" Ken sputtered.

"No, we went to sleep! That's all that happened!" Omi cried, blushing bright red.

"Uh huh, so that wasn't your bed knocking against the wall, eh?" Yohji snickered. He didn't blame them, I mean tensions were high. But it sure as hell was fun to tease them.

"The walls are pretty thin, you know?" he reminded.

"Yeah, like you and Aya are any quieter. You two going at it is like ten times louder than us, at least we try to be qui…" Ken broke off when Aya glared at him.

"If you had someone this sexy in your bed you'd be loud, too!" Yohji wrapped an arm around Aya's shoulders and kissed him on the cheek. Aya shoved him off, glaring.

"Goodnight, guys. And try to keep it down, kay?" Ken said with a laugh as he whipped around the corner out of Aya's reach.

"Actually we're sleeping on the couch. Grumpy here won't leave this floor. So there won't be any fun for me tonight, I suppose, but I'm tired, so its fine," Yohji caught Aya by the wrist when the man moved to go after Ken.

"Ken, go and grab some blankets!" Omi shouted.

"Aya, save it for the bad guys. You can beat him bloody after we kill Schwartz, kay?" Aya nodded, grabbing Yohji's arm and yanking him over to the couch and shoving him down onto it.

"Aya, what the hell!" Yohji shouted, but then Aya lay down on top of him, and got comfortable. Okay, apparently sleep time was now and Aya wanted Yohji ready for him to use as a pillow.

"You scared?" Yohji asked, running a hand through Aya's hair. Their mission gear was going to get wrinkled to hell, which would piss Aya off when they woke up. Yohji waited, wondering if he should tell him. Yeah, he supposed he should, otherwise Aya would take that frustration out on him.

"Aya, take your jacket off, gonna get it wrinkled," Yohji winced as Aya sat up so fast that he elbowed him in the ribs. He was pretty sure he would have a huge bruise tomorrow.

Yohji sat up and removed his own coat, might as well. Aya, ever the neat freak yanked the coat out of Yohji's hands and folded it on the table next to his own.

"Here," Ken inched forward with two blankets.

"Aya, lay down." Yohji pulled Aya down on top of himself again.

"Ken, be a good boy and tuck us in," Yohji grinned from ear to ear, holding tight to Aya, who was struggling to get up so that he could grab the blankets himself.

"Serves you right, Ken," Omi laughed from the doorway as Ken draped the blankets over them.

"Aya, calm down! It was just a joke!" Yohji laughed.

"Not worth it," Aya growled, and finally lay his head back down against Yohji's chest.

Author's notes: thanks for the review bat. J


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

Aya was on edge. It had been three days now. Did Schwartz not give a damn about Shuldig? Crawford was his lover for Gods' sake, didn't he care? But then again Crawford could see the future, so he knew already that Shuldig was dead. He wondered if the man knew the details.

"Aya, you're killing the daisies," Omi cried. Aya looked at the drenched flowers that he had been spraying. Damn, he was right. That would come out of sales.

"Aya, why don't you go and cook dinner, Ken and I can take over from here. You need some down time," Omi said carefully, looking for all the world like Aya was going to fly off the handle and kill him.

"I think you and Yohji need to go and…" Omi elbowed Ken in the ribs. Aya had to fight not to react to Ken's words. The boy could be so damned blunt sometimes.

"hn," Aya turned on his heel and went to go and find the blonde. It was hard, even thought the bandages were gone it was hard to get used to only seeing out of one eye. It pissed him off.

He almost barrelled Yohji over as he stormed into the kitchen.

"Hey, babe, I thought I would cook dinner for you this time. I think you need a break," Yohji kissed him on the lips, soft and anything but demanding.

"Don't call me that," Aya whispered against his lips before kissing him back. Aya kept the kiss as soft as Yohji liked. They hadn't made love over the past few days and his libido was demanding that he undress Yohji right here and fuck in the kitchen, but he wasn't about to give in to those urges.

"What are you making?" Aya kissed Yohji's eyelids before slowly moving out of his arms to go and look at the stove. It was a simple stir fry, but it smelled so good.

"I'm not as good of a cook as you, but I figured I would give it a go. You need some time to relax. Unfortunately I saw Manx a few minutes ago. So we're going to have a mission tonight. But at least you can sit down and enjoy my cooking." Yohji's hand ran down his spine in a slow comforting caress.

Aya nodded. He looked down at his clothes. He was wearing tight jeans and a black turtle neck sweater. He'd had to put his mission clothes in the wash this morning. He couldn't exactly wear them while working in the shop and he couldn't keep wearing them for however long it took Schwartz to show up. But as soon as they were done in the dryer he was going to put them back on for the mission.

"I wonder who they want us to kill today," Yohji mused as he stirred up the meat and vegetables.

"maybe they know where Schwartz is hiding now. I highly doubt they're still in the same place waiting for us to attack." Aya slid up behind Yohji wrapping his arms around his waist and leaning against him.

"Once we're done eating why don't we make use of that empty bed of ours upstairs," Aya didn't have to look to know that Yohji was smirking.

"Hn," Aya knew that it would ease his nerves. He was tired of watching the windows, wondering when Schwartz was coming after them.

"You really haven't eaten much since we escaped. I want to make sure that you're still healthy, so you had better eat some of this." Yohji turned, yanking Aya against his chest.

"I'll bet you're really needy, right? We haven't really had any alone time lately." Aya nodded, yeah, his body was ready. Every time he looked at Yohji in those leather pants his mouth went dry.

"I figured as much. Well, this stuff can wait a moment," Yohji dragged Aya to one of the supply closets.

"Yohji!" Aya wanted to be pissed at being dragged and thrown up against the wall. But really he had no complaints as Yohji turned him around and started yanking his pants down over his hips.

"You want this, right? Tell me to stop if you don't…"

"Hurry up already!" Aya snapped. He wasn't going to stay like this forever. He groaned as one of Yohji's fingers slipped inside him.

"That good?" Yohji asked, slowly sliding a second finger inside him. Aya gasped as Yohji hit his prostate, that was more than good!

"Hurry!" Aya snarled. He wasn't going to come until Yohji…Yohji laughed, calling him impatient before he lined up his member and slowly prodded at him. Aya shoved his hips back, taking him in all at once.

"Shit, Aya! How many times do I have to tell you not to do that!" Yohji gasped. Aya knew it wasn't because it didn't feel good, it was because he thought he was going to hurt him.

Yohji clutched his hips and drew back almost all the way before driving his hips forward and slamming back in, over and over. Aya arched in his arms, turning his head at an awkward angle while reaching his arms back, pulling Yohji down for a kiss.

"So good!" Yohji gasped in his ear. Aya had to fight not to grin. He didn't last long. It had been too long since he'd had this that his body came fast.

"No stamina," Yohji teased, but he was coming as well.

"hn," Aya gasped as Yohji drew out of his body, grabbing one of the rags off the shelf and cleaning them up.

Aya's stomach grumbled. He was hungry.

"Could those two be any louder?" Ken's voice made Aya blush right back to his ears. Had they really been that loud?

"Ken, shut up, they'll hear you!" Omi whispered loudly.

"Heh! Well, that's one point for them after I teased them," Yohji laughed, dragging Aya out of the supply closet.

"Ken, you shouldn't make comments like that. Aya heard you," Yohji laughed even louder. Ken backed up at Aya's glare. He was surprised he could glare with his face blushing that hard.

Author's notes: thanks chinchan for your review. =)


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter .14

Yohji grinned as he moved behind Aya. The target was not on this floor, they had checked every corner of every room. He snickered as he smacked Aya on the ass. The redhead spun and punched him square in the jaw. He supposed he'd deserved that, but it was still hilarious.

Aya had been on edge for a while now, so he supposed that teasing him wasn't the smartest thing to do.

"If you ever…"

"Do that again you're going to kill me," Yohji drawled, finishing his sentence. Aya pinned him with a glare and Yohji could hear Aya's knuckles groaning as he gripped his sword tighter.

"What if I do this?" He grabbed Aya around the waist and jerked him into his arms for a kiss that was cut short when a bullet zinged the wall next to Aya's head.

Aya ducked into the next room, dragging Yohji with him. Yohji could tell Aya was trying hard not to beat the shit out of him while bullets followed them into the room.

"Shit! I swear we were alone a second ago!" Yohji hissed. Aya wouldn't even spare him a glance. The man suddenly ran out from hiding toward whomever was there with a gun. Was he fucking crazy!

"Get your ass back here!" Yohji shouted. There wasn't any point on keeping a low profile when they were already being shot at.

His eyes widened as he watched Aya stagger back before launching himself at the man with the gun.

Shit, Aya was hit, but where? It wasn't the head, which was good, because he sure as hell didn't want to ever see that again!

Aya drove his sword through the man's chest before he staggered back against the wall, clutching his shoulder. How he was able to still use his hands to stab the man was beyond Yohji. And what was worse was that it was his good arm. Aya was ambidextrous, but that didn't mean that his right arm wasn't better than the left. Shit, couldn't they have fought Schwartz before this mission?

Two more guards ran into the room. Yohji grabbed Aya around the waist and yanked him back into the other room.

"Aya, stay here, I'll take them out!" Yohji whispered to him, kissing him quickly on the lips. He felt like shit. If he hadn't been too busy hitting on Aya the man wouldn't have been shot.

"No," Aya gripped his sword tighter and ran out into the hallway again. Yohji was right behind him, trying to catch up as he released his wires at one of them. Aya was moving slower than normal, which Yohji knew was from the blood loss. Yohji yanked hard enough to kill the man before he shot his wires at the second man, stopping him from shooting just in time to see the man's next bullet zing past Aya's head, grazing his ear just enough to make it trickle blood.

"Aya, what the hell! When I tell you to stay put you bloody well stay put!" Yohji growled at him as he pulled his wires back.

"I'm not one of your women, Yohji, I'm not going to sit back and let you protect me!" Aya bumped shoulders with him as he stormed past him, which Yohji was pretty sure hurt Aya more than himself.

"I wasn't saying that! But you've been shot because you were too bullheaded to wait until they had to reload!" Yohji wanted to pull his hair out with frustration.

Aya didn't have to say anything, the glare he fixed on Yohji was enough, it meant 'maybe if you'd kept your damned hands to yourself and focused on the mission it would've gone off without a hitch.

"We've taken out the target," Ken's voice radioed in. Yohji grabbed Aya's left arm and looped it around his shoulders while sliding his arm around Aya's back. The man gave in and let him help him walk down the hallway, up the stairs, and out the back doors.

"If you ever pull a stunt like that again I'll kill you," Aya warned, and Yohji knew that he meant it. He had jeopardized the mission and he damned well knew it.

"What the hell happened to him?" Ken demanded as Yohji helped Aya into the car. Aya didn't say anything, just turned his head toward the window and watched as Ken started to drive.

"I got careless and he got shot because of it," Yohji admitted.

"Yeah, well, don't go making it a trend. What did you do?" Ken was watching him in the rearview mirror.

"I kissed him," Yohji knew what was going to come when Ken parked the car in front of the flower shop. He didn't even try to dodge as Ken punched him as hard as he could in the face. That was two hits now.

"Yohji, why would you do something like that?" Omi was glaring at him.

"I thought we were alone and I…I don't know why I did it. The entire floor was empty, we'd checked it! I don't know where those guards came from! I thought we were in the clear!" Yohji made a grab for Aya when the redhead forced himself, swaying out of the car. Aya pulled away from him, nearly falling in the process.

Ken was the one to catch him, and Yohji noted that Aya didn't pull away from Ken. Aya was really seriously pissed.

"C'mon, Aya, I'll patch you up," Ken said, holding tighter when Aya stumbled.

"I'll patch him up," Yohji felt he needed to do it, it was the least he could do to even try to apologise.

"Ken can do it," Aya growled at him.

"Yohji, why don't you give our half of the mission report to Omi, and don't leave _anything_ out!"

"Shit!" the last thing he wanted was for Kritiker to know he'd tried to make out with Aya on a mission!

"We'll leave that part out, we'll just say you started a fight with him," Omi said once Aya was out of hearing range.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Aya could hear Manx downstairs. His shoulder killed, especially after Ken butchered him searching for the bullet. It didn't matter though, it didn't hurt as much as his eye did. It had been hell trying to shower without pulling any stitches.

He hated that his equilibrium was still off a bit, making him a fraction of a second slower than normal. He could hear someone else downstairs, a stranger.

"Abyssinian, I'm glad you're feeling strong enough to be up and about. I would like to introduce your newest member of Weiss. This is Korat." Aya looked past her at the tall black haired Japanese man. The man could compete with Yohji with looks to kill and clothes that left little to the imagination.

"Where's Yohji?" Aya asked, looking around. He didn't see the blonde anywhere.

"Yohji is no longer part of Weiss. We have assigned him elsewhere. If he can't stop picking fights with his teammates then he can't back you up anymore."

"What exactly do you think happened?" Aya asked, knowing that there was a lie somewhere. He could guess it was Omi meddling again.

"He hit you and you two started fighting out in the hallway, resulting in you getting shot. So far since the beginning of this quarter you have been shot in the head protecting him, lost your eye going on a personal mission, and shot in the arm because he picked a fight. This isn't a kindergarten and we expect our operatives to be serious about their missions. Your relationship is getting in the way of the team dynamics," Aya hated it, but he had to agree with her reasoning.

"I know you're injured, but are you up for a mission tonight? It won't be anything as dangerous as last night. It is a job retrieving information for the next mission." Aya nodded, like he would ever turn down a mission.

"Where is Yohji?" Aya asked again. He hated repeating himself, but he needed to know where the blonde was.

"Yohji gathered his things this morning. I thought he told you," Omi looked pale, like he thought Aya was going to attack him.

Aya shoved past Omi to storm into the kitchen. He was hungry.

"Nice to meet you, Abyssinian!" The stranger's voice called after him. Aya didn't answer him. He didn't like that Yohji had been replaced, it left him feeling empty inside. But he also didn't want to get shot again because Yohji couldn't keep his damned hands to himself.

"Sounds like he wasn't much of a back up if you've gotten hurt so many times," Korat was behind him. Aya wanted to grab him by the neck and start slamming him against the wall over and over.

He turned and fixed a glare on the man, warning him to tread carefully.

"Whoa, if looks could kill, gorgeous," the man grinned at him.

"Don't call me that," Aya winced as pain shot through his eye. Damned thing was acting up again.

"Don't you want to know anything about your new teammate? I sure as hell want to know who I'm backing up," the guy was grinning at him. That pissed Aya off even more.

"Can you at least give me a name to call you by? I figure if I call you by your codename all the time someone might catch on."

"Aya," Aya was glad that the man didn't ask why it was a girl's name.

"Mine's Shin," the man held his hand out.

"Didn't ask you your name," Aya pointed out before turning around to go through the cupboards to get out the frying pan. He was starving.

"Let me cook something. You really should be taking it easy on that arm," Shin reached for the pan, only to have Aya yank it out of his reach.

"I'm not an invalid, Shin," Aya said his name like it was venom. This man would learn quickly not to bother him. The others had learned quickly, well, except Yohji, that man had always tossed teases his way.

"Aya, I am so sorry! I thought Yohji had told you and…" Omi ran toward him. Aya couldn't stop his fist before it cracked against Omi's cheek. The Chibi didn't deserve it, but it made Aya feel better. He knew he was being a bastard.

"Aya, what the hell! Don't take your frustrations out on Omi!" Ken shouted, barging into the room.

Aya took a step toward Ken, who paled and pulled Omi out of the room with him.

"Shin, you might want to leave him alone right now. He's hard to deal with on a normal day, and right now he's pretty pissed off." Ken warned.

"I can hold my own," Shin said with a grin, looking Aya up and down. If that bastard thought he was going to replace Yohji in other ways he was in for a disappointment.

Aya threw the pan on the stove, turning the burner on. He shoved his way past Shin to get the butter.

Aya tossed a knife in his direction which was easily caught.

"Make yourself useful," Aya growled, yanking the fridge door open so hard it almost snapped off.

The man grinned as Aya shoved some vegetables his way. Aya grabbed his own knife and started chopping up some firm tofu.

"What are we making?" Shin asked, cutting like a master. Did he have to be so damned good at it?

"Haven't decided yet," Aya admitted in a monotone.

"So, what happened with this Yohji to get you hurt so many times? I mean I've been on teams that have had their spats, but none that haven't been able to function as a team because of it. What happened?"

"He started to care too much and I started to trust him," it wasn't a lie, but he wasn't about to get into a conversation about their relationship to a stranger.

"You really don't like people giving two shitts about you, do you? That's why you keep everyone at an arm's length, terrified you might beat the shit out of them," Shin wasn't asking. Aya hated that the man could read him.

"We're killers, we don't deserve people giving two shitts about us. We kill and then one day we're killed. We don't deserve love or friendship. Whatever you thought when you were assigned here I'm afraid you're in for a disappointment," Aya poured a huge amount of rice into the rice cooker.

"Ken and Omi seem friendly enough, even caught them holding hands when I first came in. I think its just you who has those issues. And just so you know, I always care about other operatives, whether they're hardasses like you or sweet like Omi."

Shin dropped the vegetables into the pan and started stirring them around.

Aya wanted to be alone, he needed time to let Yohji's disappearance sink in, to cry for what was lost. It was true that Yohji's actions had put them in that situation, but Aya was the one who'd run out to kill the enemy. There was no way around it, but it had still been his decision.

"Manx didn't run the mission by me. Its her way of forcing us to talk to each other, so talk!" Aya turned to face Shin, waiting.

"Shit, I don't know why you hate me so damned much. You don't even know me,"

"Hn," Aya wasn't even going to dignify that with an answer. He stared the man down, waiting.

"Our job is to secure the main floor while Siberian and Bombay collect the information. There are no real targets, our job is to have their backs long enough to gather the data. After that we get the hell out of dodge. Any questions?"

"Why pair you up with me?" Aya already knew the answer, it was because he was Yohji's exact replacement, not just a new teammate.

Shin gave him a tight smile.

"Finish up here," Aya snarled, walking away. That bastard could cook it himself!

There was only one place Aya wanted to go. Yohji's room. Maybe Yohji had left him some sort of clue. He'd been pissed at Yohji, but he hadn't ended it! He'd just needed time to blow off some steam! Yohji had to know that! And even if he didn't, he knew Schwartz was gunning for them!

The mission came all too soon and went off without a hitch. Aya hadn't eaten, hadn't been able to. He ignored Shin's comment about how 'hot' he looked in mission gear. He didn't want to hear that from anyone but Yohji! not ever!

Aya had to admit that Shin was good, the man had his back better than anyone, even Yohji, but it didn't mean the same to him. He felt numb. The only thing that felt good was when he'd decapitated a guard with his sword before the man could scream.

Apparently Shin's weapon of choice was a gun with a silencer. He was a damned good shot.

Aya could feel the blood running down his fingers from having pulled his stitches. And he already knew who was at his door knocking to patch him up.

"Come in," Aya growled, pulling his shirt off to reveal the wound.

"Another one?" Shin pointed to Aya's stitched up belly from where Farfarello had stabbed him and Crawford had butchered the stitching job.

"Kritiker doesn't know about that one, do they? How many other wounds do you have because of that asshole?"

"Don't call him that!" Aya hissed.

"Apparently he wasn't the only one who cared. Good to know you're human." Shin sat down on the bed beside him with the first aid kit in his hands.

Aya watched unflinching as Shin cleaned the wound and pulled out the old stitches before adding his own. He was making sure the bastard did it right.

"For the record, Shin, if any strange German's ask you if you want to play say 'Yes' and call for us. We've killed someone from their group and suffered our own damage. I'm tired of waiting. The black haired man can see the future, the kid is a telepath, and the white haired psycho is a masochistic freak that will get off on getting beaten near to death. Leave him to me."

"O..kay," Shin looked confused, but shrugged, obviously glad to have gotten a few words out of him that weren't snarling.

Author's notes: Yep, I am a bitch, but don't worry, everything will happen in good time. Yohji's point of view is next. =)


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Yohji grinned at the man who sat down next to him.

"Heard you got kicked out of your last team. Don't know why, you were right on target that last mission, you had it down to a T. So what happened?" before Aya had come around Yohji could say this guy was his type. A guy in his late twenties with dyed blue hair, honest brown eyes, and a killer body. The guy was hot and he knew it. He had that look in his eye that Yohji was sure was in his own, confident to a fault that knew he could get in your pants with a few well placed words and smouldering looks.

"Tried to make out with a teammate on a mission and got punched in the face. Then my teammate got shot because I had distracted him." Yohji wasn't about to sugar coat it. He didn't deserve that.

"Harsh," Akio was grinning at him. "He die?" Yohji shook his head, no, Aya was pissed, but very much alive. "And why would you make out with him on a mission? Or better yet, did he like it?" Akio was both teasing and not.

"I smacked his ass and he punched me, and then I thought it was a good idea to kiss him. If it were anywhere else he would probably growl at me, but not on a mission, and never ever to the smacking his ass. He's a very private person, and I was just having fun. I swear the entire floor was empty when I grabbed onto him. Apparently there were three guards we hadn't found. I think the only reason we both didn't end up dead was because he ran through the bullets at one of them and killed the second one even though his better sword arm was bleeding. I had a chance to take out the other one, but he was already looking pretty bad by the time I got him back to the car."

"Did you apologise?" Akio was grinning at him and passing him a beer. Yohji lit up a new cigarette. He had no idea how many he'd been just sitting there and smoking like a chimney. Akio lit up next to him. There was one main advantage of this group, and that was that they all smoked. He didn't have to sneak outside and get glared at by Aya every time he came in smelling like smoke.

"If you've ever met Aya you'd know that you can't apologise to Aya without getting the shit kicked out of you. Its just the way he is. Hell, I'm surprised he didn't kill me. Nothing compromises his missions, not unless its in his personal agenda. Kissing me isn't exactly a priority of his."

"But it was a priority of yours?" Akio bumped his knee against Yohji's.

"Have you ever met Aya? Guy's beyond hot, and we finally got past all the bullshit and then this happens! Kritiker wouldn't have given a shit if he hadn't gotten hurt. But our track record as a team has been downright pathetic lately, so I can understand them sending me away."

"Weiss has been pretty bad lately? That's a new one on me. Last I heard you guys were pretty level headed. You guys get things done better than us assholes. We're more sent in for the missions that don`t need as much skill as yours, really. Hell, Shin was freaking when he heard he was going to be a part of Weiss and I can`t blame him."

"Sent in a replacement already, eh? Not that I can blame them. On my watch Aya has been shot in the head, captured by a psychopath and had to drive himself home with his body so riddled full of drugs that he crashed and barely managed to drag himself back home. Had to get doctors for him both those times because the injuries were so severe. We were okay for a while, but then I had a jealous outburst and Aya left the team. I had to tie him up in my wires just to hold him still long enough to listen to reason. Once again Kritiker learns he was hurt because of me.

"Then, while he is recovering from various wounds those fucker Schwartz…they're a group of psychotic psychics that have been gunning for us for a while, they smash the flowershop window while Aya is doing inventory and they take him down. He didn't have any weapons on him because he was just going through the books. Mastermind probably got into his head the second he tried to fight back, and slowed him down, either that or Nagi froze Aya's body in place. I don't know how it went down, but they took him. For a while all we could find were pictures on the net in different locations each time, each time sporting different injuries. When we found him those fucking psychics had gotten into his head and made him think that we were his enemies. When we brought him home he tried to kill us. We had to chain him up like a dog until he could be trusted. Couple car accidents later and he and I end up, once again, with Schwartz, only this time Aya loses an eye and gets stabbed in the stomach. And now he's been shot in the arm."

"Sounds like the guy's pretty accident prone. Let me guess, Bombay? We've looked up all the members, by code name and info, no pictures or real names on file. The files say Bombay's your weakest fighter. To be honest, though, we were surprised you were the one to get replaced. We thought we were getting Siberian. Then you show up, and we're like 'no fucking way! What the hell did he do?' and now I have my answer."

"Abyssinian's the one who's been injured because of me, again and again." Akio started choking on his beer.

"Yeah, I know. Bombay is in perfect health. He and Siberian are probably snoring in each other's arms right now. Aya, well, he's probably ripping his stitches practicing with his sword on the roof."

"Um, heh, I'll bet Shin is giving him a run for his money. Shin's an alright guy, but he sees something pretty and he tends to obsess, and on top of that the guy's been pretty excited to be anywhere near Abyssinian. Honestly we knew about you guys when we were first formed and we've wanted to work with you. We've run into other teams on missions before, which was amazing. So we were hoping to compare notes with you and Abyssinian."

"Don't count out Ken and Omi, those two are pretty good. Omi makes up for lack of hand to hand skills with his computer skills. Kid is more than useful. He also writes our mission reports and lets us go and sleep it off even though he's exhausted, too. Ken is a hothead, but he's a damned good fighter. Aya's amazing, and…"

"And Shin's probably practically humping his leg right now if you said he's even a little good looking. That guy's impossible. But if Aya…that's a girl's name, why's he have a girl's name? Sex change?"

Yohji barked out a laugh. He was going to have to tell Aya…shit. He prayed this team met up with Weiss sometime. He didn't want it to be over between them.

"I've got an idea," Akio grabbed Yohji's arm and dragged him toward the telephone.

"Wanna hear the update? Shin loves to use the fucking phone to vent." Akio held the cigarette in his lips while dialing Shin's cell phone.

"Hey, Shin, its Akio. How's it going? They treating you alright?" Akio pressed the speakerphone button and grinned wickedly as he grabbed his cigarette out of his lips and blew out a ring of smoke.

_I don't know what I'm doing right now. I've just seen Bombay get punched in the face just for apologising on fucking Balinese's behalf. I thought I was helping Abyssinian cook dinner, but he got pissed off and made me do it all by myself._

Yohji shook his head. Aya was seriously pissed off if he hit Omi.

"So what's the big deal? You cook all the time," Akio smacked a hand over Yohji's mouth to keep the man from laughing out loud.

_I wanted to cook with him! He's smoking hot! But how the hell Balinese got two words out of him that didn't have to do with a mission is beyond me. I even patched him up and the only response I got, which was not your pissy voice telling me that I was hurting you too much, was him telling me to look out for a couple of crazy Germans! _

"And now you're in your room sulking? Is that about it? Because a hot guy turned you down. Poor you." Akio snickered.

_If I had a picture you wouldn't be laughing at me. And no, I'm not sulking, I'm watching him practice with his sword. He can't see me, I'm watching through the window… Fuck! _

"You alright, man?" Akio winced. Yohji recognized the sound of a window smashing. Akio shrugged before the two of them moved a few feet away from the phone.

"Looks like Aya caught him staring," Yohji snickered.

"No shit? He smashed the window because Shin looked at him? That's bullshit. And you haven't reported any of this to Kritiker?" Akio was shaking his head like he wanted to give Yohji a shake for being stupid.

"Never needed to. We learned his boundaries fairly quickly and stayed within them. I was allowed special privileges, though, because I sort of took advantage of him when he had amnesia, so I had time to get through his walls and actually get him to love me back. Shin's going into this as a newbie, he might have training, but he doesn't have training with Aya. Sure, they'll pull off missions together, but right now other than Aya being an antisocial fuck, he's also probably pissed about having to put up with a new member, especially if the guy wants his attention on anything other than a mission."

"So you guy's don't even talk over food? Shit, that sucks. We like to vent to each other. Hell, even you vented, I mean you're doing it right now."

"Well, the past quarter I've been venting to Aya, but before that I was keeping to myself unless I picked someone up from a club, then I vented by fucking their brains out. It only sucked when I saw Ken and Omi together. Then I kinda wanted what they had. Then I got it, and then it was taken away." Yohji was getting pissed again. He wanted to find that fucker Shin, if the guy was still alive, and fucking kill him!

"I've got an idea, why not go and kick the shit out of Shin for moving in on your territory, I mean did Aya tell you to fuck off?"

"In a round about way." Aya hadn't let him anywhere near him after the mission, letting Ken take care of his wound, that alone said that Aya didn't want him around. He figured he'd save Aya the fight by leaving without expecting anything. As far as he was concerned it was true, Aya had been hurt over and over because he hadn't had his back. I mean it wasn't possible to have his back all the time, but some of the time would've been nice.

Yohji went still when he heard movement over the speakerphone. He sighed as the line went dead. Aya had probably smashed the guy`s cell. It would be funny if it hadn`t teased him that he might hear Aya`s voice yelling at the man, or saying anything, really. Yohji hadn`t been gone long, just since the morning, but he couldn`t help but depress every time he thought he might not see Aya again.

``Come with me, I`ll get you good and drunk, it`ll make you feel better.``

Yohji had to grin at that. Beer made everything feel better! Or at least it had in the past. Maybe he could live like that again. Not sleeping with everything that moved, but being drunk more often than not. As long as he wasn`t drunk on missions he was pretty sure no one would really take notice. No one had on Weiss unless he was late for work, then he had to deal with Aya glaring at him and Omi snapping at him while Ken begged him to do something about the multitude of girls.

And he knew that his team wasn`t about to try to seduce him or anything. They just wanted to party to take the edge off. If he could keep his mind off Aya for a while then joining their party was going to be fun.

Author;s notes: I know this sort of ended up like an overview, but I was trying to have Yohji interact with a new team, and it wasn`t like he would be able to do that without telling them what had gone on. I mean who would trust someone who got kicked off their last team, right. I know I wouldn`t, ;P


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Aya crossed his arms across his chest, glaring at Manx. She had given them the mission details. He had to go back to the fucking Jade club. He was always chosen for that stupid place. Apparently he was a better dancer than the others. It was usually a mission he and Yohji would pull off, Aya as the stripper and Yohji as the talkative guy in the audience that attained the information using his charm. It had been two months, he wasn't about to stay away from Yohji any longer.

"Is there a problem, Abyssinian?" Manx asked, looking frustrated with him.

"And who exactly am I giving this lap dance to?" Aya knew the answer. Ken was too shy, Omi was too young, so that left Shin. There was no way in hell!

"Are you refusing the mission?" she asked. It would be the first one he had ever passed up.

"I am not refusing, I am setting the details myself. You can take my demands or find someone else." Manx looked seriously pissed at him.

"I will not do this mission without Balinese as my backup. Shin might be good backup, but Balinese is known at the club, as well as the fact that I am not climbing in Shin's lap. So unless Ken wants to play the part, you have no one else to turn to but Balinese. I will stay with the team he's with until further notice. While I'm gone Ken is in charge of Weiss. Any questions?" He grabbed the files out of her hands none too gently.

"Persia already anticipated your answer. Our car is waiting out front. You have five minutes to pack."

"Wait, Aya, you sure you want me to lead? What about Shin?" Ken looked seriously worried.

"I trust you, Ken. I won't be gone for more than a month to set the stage." Aya bumped shoulders with Shin as he stalked past him. He grabbed his mission gear on the way up the stairs.

"Why the hell do you hate me so much? I had your back on all of those missions! I had it hands down! That bastard never had your back every time you got hurt, so why the hell are you ditching me for him?" Shin shouted after him, following him up the stairs.

Aya shot him a glare, but kept going. He didn't owe Shin anything. All the man did was stare at his ass every chance he got. Shin was lucky that putting his sword through the window, a few well placed punches, and a cigarette welt on the arm was the most he had done. Shin had deserved every single hit, as far as he was concerned, especially when he'd caught Shin smoking inside!

Aya slammed the door in Shin's face before he gave himself a minute to smile. He hadn't been sure they would take his demands, he was pretty sure he was going to have to quit to find Yohji, but things had worked out in his favour. Now he was about to give Yohji a surprise the man couldn't run away from. He threw his clothes and mission coat into a gym bag and grabbed his sword. He was ready.

"Do they know I'm coming?" Aya asked. Manx nodded as Aya climbed into her car.

"I just contacted Sphynx, informed him that he was having another Weiss on his team, but only temporarily. This is the only time we are giving in to any demands from Weiss. The only reason we are agreeing to this is because I know you would not have been able to pull this off without his help. Sphynx is in charge of Laufer. You will give him your mission report each night."

It was in the next city, which Aya had expected. His heart was thudding in his chest as he approached the door. He didn't know if he should knock, so he waited for Manx and let her pick the lock open.

The first thing that assaulted Aya's senses was cigarette smoke, enough to kill an elephant. He coughed as he waved it away from his face. The next thing he saw was an open chip bag on the floor and a few empty bottles of beer scattered across the table. There were going to be some changes around here.

Aya dropped his things and started to clean up. There was no way in hell he was going to walk around that crap!

"He was right, you really are anal about cleanliness. I'll take care of that later, just leave it where it is. I'm Sphynx, and this shit hole is where you'll be staying," a blue haired man said with a grin, offering his hand to Aya to shake.

Aya glared at him, but dropped the bottles back onto the table so hard that one of them broke.

"Where is he?" Aya demanded, seething. He hadn't known what he would do when he saw Yohji, but now he was sure.

"Balinese, get your pretty ass down here!" Sphynx shouted up the stairs.

"The hell did I do this time?" Yohji's voice rang down the stairs. Aya's eyes narrowed as he wondered why they hadn't told Yohji he was coming.

Aya closely watched the three other men as they slinked into the room, a beer bottle in each of their hands. No wonder Yohji hadn't visited him, he'd found a pit where he could drink and smoke all he wanted.

"Aya? What the hell are you doing here? And in mission gear with Manx. Anyone want to fill me in?" Yohji looked weary as he watched Aya set his bag down neatly in a corner, but still clutched his sword firmly in his gloved hands.

"Abyssinian is going to be joining us for a short time. There is a mission that he is needed for and he has demanded that you join him for it. Far be it from me to deny a member of Weiss our company," Sphynx was grinning from ear to ear. Aya couldn't be bothered with him right now. Right now all he could see was Yohji as the man ran down the stairs to see him.

Aya drew his sword. He wasn't going to kill Yohji, but he sure as hell was going to hurt him for leaving without a word!

"Aya, put it down," Yohji griped, but didn't spare a second to have his wires ready.

Aya's blood was boiling. He was beyond pissed. He'd had a month to get even more pissed with each passing moment. He pointed the sword at Yohji and then charged, ducking under the wire that was shot at his head. He wasn't about to get caught around the neck!

He flipped his sword around and struck Yohji in the neck with the back of the blade hard enough to send him sputtering to the ground.

"I should kill you!" Aya hissed, booting him hard in the ribs.

"I know. I'm sorry," Yohji rasped, hacking as he turned onto his side.

"Idiot, You don't even know what you're sorry for, do you? No note! Nothing!" Aya shouted. It hurt his throat to shout in this smoky room.

That split second Aya wasted shouting ended up with a wire wrapped tightly around his torso so hard that he dropped his sword.

"Stop it, Aya!" Yohji was climbing to his feet. Aya struggled against the wire, feeling it slice into him in thin lines all over.

"You're going to hurt yourself if you keep it up. I can pretty well guess what mission they would need the two of us for, what kind Ken would back out on and Omi wouldn't be fit for. If you're cut up all over you won't be very attractive when you have to strip, now will you?" Shit, he had a point. Aya went still, which made Yohji grin from ear to ear. Aya knew it wasn't because he had stopped struggling, it was because he had just confirmed to Yohji that he would be getting a lap dance. Now he really wanted to punch him.

"How was Shin?" Sphynx asked once Yohji let Aya loose.

"Good backup, but he's a pain in the ass," Aya answered honestly.

"He hit on you?" Yohji asked, this time it was Yohji who looked murderous. Aya nodded, half hoping Yohji would track the bastard down and kick the crap out of him.

Yohji approached him cautiously, reaching out and dragging the collar of Aya's shirt down over his shoulder to inspect the healing wound. Aya already knew that it was almost completely healed.

"By the way, guys, you might want to put out your cigarettes whenever he's in the room or he'll probably put a hurt on you. Did Shin try to smoke in the house?" Yohji deposited a kiss to the side of his neck before drawing back.

Aya nodded, yeah, that prick had tried to smoke inside, and right in Aya's view, too!

"You hurt him?" Yohji grinned when Aya nodded.

"He report you?" Aya shrugged, like he cared. If Shin reported anything it was to Omi, who wasn't about to go telling Persia every time they had a little spat.

"Missed you."

"Can't make an entire sentence anymore? That's what alcohol does to the brain," Aya brushed past him, going back to grabbing his gear.

"Abyssinian, your room is this way," Sphynx climbed to his feet and led Aya up the stairs and down the hall.

"And Yohji's room?" Sphynx pointed to the last room on the left. Shit, he was going to have to cross the entire hallway past everyone's rooms whenever he wanted to sneak into Yohji's.

Author's notes: My friend Mary told me that Laufer meant runners, so I'll believe her. ;P


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Yohji had tried to help Aya unpack, but the man had slammed the door in his face, telling him that he wasn't about to let someone 'slovenly' decide where his things should go.

Yohji found his way back downstairs, his throat still burning from Aya's attack.

"You told us he was antisocial, you didn't tell me you were bringing a psychopath into our place." Akio looked worried. Yohji had seen the hero-worship thing they all had in their eyes when they looked at Aya, that was until the guy had attacked Yohji. Now they were apprehensive.

"First off, I didn't bring him here, I didn't even know he was coming, or I would've warned you about his temper, which you really should've known about when he threw his sword through the window at Shin while we were on the phone." Yohji scrubbed his hands over his face.

"What are his triggers, then? The last thing any of us want is to have to fight for our lives in our own place. If he comes at me like that I won't hesitate, and neither will they," Akio sat down on the couch, gesturing for Yohji to do the same.

"I guess the real question is what aren't triggers, heh! Okay, well, don't follow my lead too much on how to deal with him. I have special privileges. Don't harass him in any way. If he glares at you just drop whatever topic you were on. If he gets a tick under his eye then drop everything and just walk away, don't apologise, just go. Don't bother him when he's drinking tea. Don't stare around him, and don't touch him. Clean up after yourself and for the love of God don't smoke around him. Oh, and if he has a book in his lap don't interrupt him, just stand there and wait until he looks up at you. He has no sense of humour, for the most part, and hates loud noise. He'll put up with it, but it puts him on edge toward everything else."

Everyone was staring at him, looking like they were going to need to write things down. Yohji figured he had better get a head start on the cleaning before Aya came back down the stairs.

"He's anal about just about everything, especially cleanliness. Which means we'd better pick this shit up." He grabbed the beer bottles and scattered food. He was pretty sure Aya had been disgusted when he'd come in.

"If you guys aren't going to help me clean up can you at least open the windows to get some of the smoke out." the men moved at once, shoving all the windows open and getting to work on cleaning.

Akio shook his head at them with a laugh, and Yohji knew why, he'd told the guys an hour ago to clean this shit up and they had all laughed and walked away, now they had the brooms out and everything.

Yohji bumped into Aya as he was drying the dishes.

Aya moved around him and went to the stove, turning on the burners and getting started with dinner.

"Thanks," Yohji kissed his cheek so fast that he was sure no one had seen.

"You alright?" Yohji made sure, clapping a hand on Aya's shoulder to make sure the redhead was paying attention to him.

"I had to threaten to not do the mission just so that they would let me know where you were. I even almost threatened to quit," everything around them went silent. Yohji could see that Aya wasn't comfortable with that, but the man wasn't telling everyone to fuck off, so he was pretty sure that Aya was dealing with his discomfort.

"Ken's leading Weiss right now, so that Shin bastard is probably getting a different kind of shit kicked out of him." Yohji laughed at that. Yeah, Ken was probably making him play soccer non-stop, and Ken played rough when it was his team, he'd even plowed through Omi a few times. Even Aya ended up with bruises sometimes playing against Ken.

"They treating you right around here?" Aya asked, looking him in the eye. Now that was being put on the spot. If they had been treating him bad he would've admitted it immediately as he looked into Aya's now-mismatched eyes. The only eye that could see him was the violet one, the white one was permanently damaged. He'd hoped Aya would miraculously heal even though he knew better.

"Yeah. If I had to be away from Weiss, I'm glad its here."

"Good, then I won't have to kill everyone in the room that's staring at me right now. Because I'm trying to cook in the kitchen and all I see is morons who don't know when a conversation is meant to be private. What do you see?"

"I see my partner already making enemies with the team. A good team, Aya, and they aren't morons, they're just cautious and curious, two things that are very good. Be nice, kay?" Yohji patted him on the head like a child, knowing how much it would piss him off.

Aya didn't disappoint when he smacked Yohji over the head with the spatula.

"Its good to see you, Aya." Aya waved him away.

"Guys, I think that's all the cleaning we're allowed to do right now. We'll finish later. Aya's cooking, and his cooking is always amazing, so lets just sit down and enjoy a drink,"

"No alcohol, Yohji!" Aya growled, catching him by the arm.

"Okay, you guys can all enjoy a drink, I'm helping Aya in the kitchen," Yohji laughed, why didn't Aya just come right out and say that he didn't want Yohji going back to his drinking days. Instead he was making it look like he was chastising a child for wanting a cookie.

Yohji hopped up onto the counter, laughing as Aya pulled him down to stand. Some things never changed.

"Not getting laid in a month is doing wonders for your personality," Yohji snickered. He grinned when he saw a twitch at the corner of Aya's lips.

"Oh, what was that? Was that a smile? And me without my camera!" Yohji shouted, his voice carrying through the house. He didn't know why, but he wanted the team to know he'd made Aya smile. Maybe it was to try to ease the guys up a bit, or maybe it was because he wanted them to know that they actually did get along.

"Can I help?" Yohji watched Aya cut up vegetables and start mixing them with whatever he wanted. It was one of those 'with everything in it' things that Aya had perfected but Ken had murdered.

"Schwartz still hasn't shown their faces. I don't…I didn't want to be away from you until we had at least killed them. They aren't after Omi and Ken the way they are after us. I haven't even seen them lurking around corners, and Nagi's website is at a standstill."

"So other than being pent up, you're also frustrated to shit because the only killing you've been able to do has been on regular missions," Yohji was beginning to see the whole picture. Aya smacked Yohji's hand when he reached to start helping cut things up.

"You cut them too thick," Aya reminded him. Yohji didn't have the precision cutting Aya had, so he wasn't allowed to help with vegetables, just with meat.

"Just wait until I get you alone," Yohji whispered against his ear before giving it a quick nip. Aya shuddered. He was glad he still had that affect on him.

"No flower shop," Aya pointed out, tossing things into the wok.

"Looking at those guys, do you think you would ever see them in a flower shop?"

"Point," Aya conceded, shoving Yohji out of his way as he went back to the fridge for more of whatever the hell it was that he was trying to make.

"Electronics store. Trust me, much easier to maintain and a lot less smelly. Of course that also means a lot less girls around, but I'm sure you can handle that disappointment," Yohji couldn't help but tease, he had missed Aya so badly.

"Can hardly contain my disappointment," Aya smiled at him full on, which made Yohji's heart do a backflip.

"The guys and I are going to go out front for a smoke, you coming Kudou?" Akio asked.

Akio froze at the sight of Aya's smile, visibly relaxing now that he knew the two weren't going to murder each other in the kitchen. He knew damned well that Akio knew he wasn't coming, he was just checking in on them to make sure they weren't fighting.

Aya glared, storming toward Akio.

"Aya, the food?" Yohji took him by the arm and steered him back toward the stove. Aya went back to cooking like nothing had happened.

Author's notes: Okay, two chapters in one sitting!


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Aya waited until he heard Sphynx leave before he set everything down and moved into Yohji's arms, kissing him hard. Yohji yanked him even closer, crushing him up against his chest. Aya groaned into his mouth, he'd missed this. One of Yohji's hands cupped his cheek while the other moved over his back like he was trying to memorize the feel of him.

Aya let Yohji back him up against the wall and pin his wrists with one hand. Yohji's leg nudged between his, pressing them flush against each other while using his free hand to grope down his side and down toward his ass.

"I want you right now," Yohji whispered against his lips, moving his hips against his so hard that Aya gasped. He needed this so badly.

Aya leapt away from Yohji when he heard the door bang open. His cheeks stained red. He turned his attention back to cooking before anyone came into the room.

"Very cute, Aya," Yohji chuckled, making Aya blush even harder. He was so glad that no one was standing in front of him.

"Is it food yet?" Sphynx snickered, letting Aya know that he knew exactly what had been going on. He was positive that Sphynx was the only one that knew about their relationship.

"Hn," Aya looked everything over, it was a few seconds cooked too long, but no one would notice, no one ever noticed when something was a tad off, not like he did.

"That's a yes 'hn', not a no 'hn'," Yohji translated for him. Aya shook his head.

"Idiot," Aya growled, turning to face him now that he knew he wasn't blushing anymore.

"If you keep calling me that I'm going to come up with something to call you, and it will be equally as mean," Yohji warned. Last time he had done that Yohji had called him 'love bunny' for a week. It had ended when Aya had attacked him.

"Make yourself useful," Aya monotoned at him. Yohji grinned and grabbed the plates. Did the guy always have to look so damned happy? Aya supposed that, even though it pissed him off, he liked Yohji's smile.

"If you put any salt on it I'll kill you," Aya warned. His food was perfect, and he wouldn't have it ruined by over-salting like Yohji did every now and then.

"I won't put anything on it and neither will they, promise," Yohji reached over and pinched Aya on the cheek.

Aya punched him hard on the shoulder, making him cuss, but stop teasing.

"Eat all of it. No one wastes what I cook," Aya warned everyone as he dished out their plates.

"What if it tastes like shit?" one of the guys asked with a grin, obviously having taken Yohji's teasing as an incentive to add in his own.

Aya turned on his heel, stalking toward the man. The man voiced an 'oh shit' and backed off.

"If you don't think you'll like the taste of something that smells this good then don't hold out your plate for a serving, right Aya, those are the rules." Aya nodded at Yohji. Weiss had learned the rules right away after Aya had pointed his sword at them and waited until every plate was empty and cleaned.

"And everyone has to do their dishes right after," Yohji said, voicing Aya's thoughts. He was glad, he didn't feel like talking. He wanted food, and then to drag Yohji off into a dark corner to show him exactly how much he'd missed him.

Aya swayed on his feet. _Shit, not right now! _Yohji caught him before he fell.

"Aya, what the hell?" Yohji looked him over, seeming to suddenly notice that Aya wasn't perfectly healthy. He hadn't been able to keep much food down since Yohji left. He'd eaten, but only small amounts for an entire month. Omi had been worried, and Ken had been hiding how little he was eating by taking extra helpings to make it look like Aya had eaten.

"Not feeling good?" One of Yohji's hands pressed to his forehead, but Aya shook him off, forcing his body to right itself.

"Hn," Aya put a small amount of food onto his own plate. Yohji grabbed the spoon from him and put a hell of a lot more on his plate.

"Haven't been eating much? Well we're going to have to change that, now aren't we? If you don't give a shit about how you feel, then at least eat enough to be on your feet for the mission." Aya knew that Yohji was just using it as a scare tactic, but damned if it didn't work every time.

"Sit your ass down at the table, I'll bring you your plate. If I ever catch you eating like a bird I will kick the shit out of you," Yohji warned. Aya knew he was being childish, but he stepped into Yohji's space and glared right into his eyes.

"Glare all you like, but I'm not joking," Yohji shoved him back. Aya swung at him, but his fist was caught easily.

"I swear once I'm done eating…"

"Once we're done eating you and I are going into my room to talk. We have a lot of catching up to do," Yohji winked at him. Aya pulled his fist away and stalked toward the table, seething inside until Yohji's meaning caught up with him. _Talk! Yohji meant_… Aya forced himself not to blush.

Aya caught Sphynx's grin as he sat down gracefully in one of the chairs. The table was disgusting, there was old splashed food all over it.

"Oh, for God's sake!" Yohji, obviously reading his face, grabbed a cloth and towel. Aya watched him clean the table before anyone was allowed sitting down.

Everyone was silent at the table, watching him out of the corners of their eyes like he was going to flip out and kill them.

Yohji set the plate in front of him before sitting down with his own.

"Eat all of it," Yohji warned the same way Aya had just warned everyone else. Aya clutched his fork tightly for a second, considering stabbing Yohji in the arm with it. Yohji must've heard his knuckles crack, because the man's eyes were suddenly riveted on the fork.

"Aya?" Aya shook his head, deciding against it. No matter how good his food was and smelled he didn't have an appetite, he hadn't in a while.

"Do you need me to feed you?" Yohji's voice was still tight. It wasn't a tease, it was a warning.

"Hn," Aya took a test bite. It tasted good enough, but his stomach was roiling in protest. He wasn't about to show Yohji that weakness, the man had seen enough!

"Well, I must say it is nice to finally meet the guy that Kudou…attacked on a mission," the pause told Aya everything he needed to know, Yohji had confided in Sphynx but not the others.

"Though why he would choose someone like you to attack is beyond all of us," one of the others snickered.

"What can I say? Aya is very attackable," Yohji grinned at him. Aya rolled his eyes.

"The guys and I are going drinking tonight, you two coming?" Sphynx asked, quirking an eyebrow at Aya, obviously thinking he would turn it down. He was right.

"We have to start setting the stage for the mission as soon as possible." Aya said, choking down the last of his food.

"Which basically means Aya has to start stripping tonight and I get to be the obsessed fan. You guys are welcome to join us, if you want." Aya kicked Yohji under the table. He wanted as few people he knew in the audience as possible!

"Wouldn't miss that for the world. Do you even know how to dance, hardass?" Sphynx teased. Aya nodded, oh he knew alright.

"Only took Aya a day to pick it up. He's a natural," Yohji smirked at him, touching his knee where no one could see it.

"What exactly is the mission?" Sphynx asked, watching the two of them. Those were his mission eyes, not all that much unlike the ones he'd seen on other members of Weiss.

"Well, our target is a guy who likes to watch strippers prostitute themselves, he pays for it and then kills them. So, I'm going to get him to follow Aya and I, and we'll get to it and then kill the son of a bitch once we're sure that no one else has followed us."

"Why not have us waiting in the room to kill the fucker?" Sphynx asked.

"Because he's smarter than that, he picks the location and has his goons all over the place. His assholes are probably going to be in the room with us. So the best we can do is have you on the comm. And have you follow us. Fortunately for you it means you'll get to see us naked."

Aya slammed his open palm on the table, startling Yohji into silence. He got up from the table, collecting his plate and utensils, and went straight to the sink. He scrubbed it clean, ignoring Yohji, knowing full well that the man went back to making stupid comments again. He hated that this team was more like a bunch of Yohji's drinking buddies than a real team, well, except for Sphynx, that guy had a brain in his head.

"It takes balls to do a mission like that even if you are in love," Sphynx whispered to him as he came with his own plate. "Don't know if I could do that."

"He told you that?" Aya didn't know why, but that made him smile. It was small, but it was there.

"Yeah. He's kept it from the guys because he doesn't want everyone knowing his business, but you're all he talks to me about. Have to admit I was curious as to what you were like without all of his daydreams. It was hard to believe you were dangerous after all the nice things he had to say. Needless to say you surprised the hell out of me. I knew you were good on missions because of the records, but I had no idea that you were this interesting."

"Thank you for taking care of Yohji," Aya looked him full on, letting him know he was sincere.

"No problem." Aya moved out of the way to let Sphynx wash his dishes.

"Name?" Aya asked. He didn't care about the others, but he wanted to know this one's name.

"Akio." Aya nodded, he would remember that.

"You two having a heart to heart, how cute!" Yohji grinned. Aya glared at him.

"Know what, Aya? Why don't you get ready to dance and we'll have that discussion when we get home."

Aya nodded, heading up the stairs to where he had put all of his things.

Author's notes: thanks for the review Ranma. =)


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20

Yohji hated that Aya had to ride separately from him. Of course someone would notice if the stripper came in with the supposed 'obsessed fan'. So Aya had called Ken to drop off his Porsche, threatening to kill the boy if he so much as scratched it. He had at least been nice enough to pay the taxi for Ken's ride home, which was a couple hundred dollars. Aya didn't care about the money, obviously knowing that he'd make about as much tonight, he always did.

"So, what's his stripper name?" Akio asked with a wicked grin.

"Hard Candy. He punched me in the face when I first suggested the name to him, but he still uses it. Best part is that because he's gorgeous he always gets accepted right away. All he has to do is walk in and demand a spot and he's in. Also he's always remembered by someone. Chances are he's posted that he's performing online. He has a huge fan base, actually. I'm surprised he hasn't had anyone recognize him at the flower shop. But then again we don't normally do those types of missions in the city. I think he might be recognized around here because this is the city he normally does this in. Should be pretty funny watching him try to deny it, too. He's so socially awkward," Yohji laughed at the looks on the guys' faces. He supposed he still wouldn't believe it himself if he hadn't seen it.

"Socially awkward is an understatement. I am so looking forward to seeing him pretend otherwise." Akio pulled up in the parking lot. It was packed. Yohji just prayed there would be room for them inside.

"Plus he's hot," one of the other guys added. Yeah, it was true enough. Yohji was so looking forward to seeing Aya like that again. Yohji hadn't even gotten to see Aya run out the door wearing whatever tight clothes he had snuck out in. Plus all the makeup Aya wore when he was on stage, anything from black lipstick to shimmering sparkles. He was prettier than any girl Yohji had ever seen and the makeup just added to that beauty instead of how the other guys looked, the others wearing makeup looked like drag queens.

"Hope you guys brought money. He won't even look our way unless we pay up. And you can forget about getting your money back from him afterward. He'll just beat the shit out of you and tell you not to come next time. I brought Ken with me one time and Ken was too shy to hold up any money so Aya ignored us completely. I smacked that kid in the back of the head later. I mean you can still see him from far away, but to know he's got his eyes locked on you is something else. Oh, and you can scream, but don't scream anything obscene at him or he'll attack you once we're alone. Its still a mission to him, and if we do anything other than hold up money he will freak."

Yohji couldn't think of anything else to warn them about. It was getting tiring having to warn them of Aya's moods. He had never ever had to do that before, and he was beginning to realize just how many things pissed Aya off. No wonder it took him having amnesia for Yohji to really pay attention to him. Even when Aya was on stage performing Yohji hadn't really paid much attention, and not because Aya didn't put on an amazing show, but because he was used to Aya being unavailable, so grinning and playing it up for someone they were going to kill was about as far as anything had ever gotten. Thinking about it now Yohji could already feel his heart thumping in his chest as he remembered how beautiful Aya was on stage. Now that they were together it was going to do a number on his libido.

"Oh yeah, and don't say much about it when he gets home unless you make it sound like any other mission. He might do a good job, but it still pisses him off to have to do it." Yohji slid out of the car, shoving his way to the front of the line with a wink at the guys posted at the doors.

"Kudou, its been a while since we've seen you around here. Must've heard the noise, every time he's here you come slinking in to stare at him. Should just ask him out already," one of the guys said with a grin, letting them right inside.

"One of these days," Yohji grinned, leading the group in with him. He shoved his way through the crowd to grab the closest place near the stage as he could. He could actually feel his hands trembling in his pockets, he was excited and nervous at the same time. He had to make sure he was just playing the part and not giving anything away to the rest of the team.

"I'll get the beers!" one of the other guys shouted, Yohji shook his head that he didn't want any. He wasn't leaving this spot until Aya was finished performing, and there was no way Aya would come near him later if he smelled like alcohol.. He found himself constantly looking at his watch. He didn't want to see these others! He wanted to see Aya up there, which was a first. Every other time he was riveted by anything to come out onto that stage, male or female. The other guys were shouting with excitement at the two girls, twins, on stage dancing together.

"If you're not drinking that makes you our designated driver," Akio handed him the keys before accepting his beer.

Yohji had no problem with that. He lit up a cigarette, ignoring the girls as they made their way toward the rest of the team, who were all holding out bills to them.

He was glad when those two were done. Their set seemed to take forever. A grin stole over his face as a rock tune blew through the speakers. He recognized it even before he saw Aya make his way out onto the stage.

Aya grinned wickedly as he started dancing. It was a grin that he used when he would rather kill something, but had to smile to make an appearance. Everyone else wouldn't be able to pick up on that, though.

Aya's mismatched eyes found him quickly, and he winked before slinking his way across the stage wearing leather pants and a mesh shirt. His eyeshadow was a dark blue, slashing with his eyeliner at the corner of his eyes, and he had on a shimmering lip gloss that made his lips look wet.

He watched Aya rip his fingers through the mesh shirt and tear it away. It was something Yohji had told him to do his first time up there, so Aya had done it every time. It kept his hair from getting messy.

Yohji's eyes widened when he heard a familiar voice in the crowd. Someone had shouted 'Abyssinian'. He turned, his eyes finding Crawford's over the crowd. The man grinned at him before going back to staring at Aya.

"Schwartz," Yohji had to shout in Akio's ear. Yohji could see Aya's eyes narrow for a second, but he kept dancing, slinking out of his pants. If any of them attacked Aya wouldn't have anything to protect himself with. Worse even, Aya wouldn't compromise the mission by defending himself. He would take the beating until someone came to save him. Aya's eyes met his for a split second while he continued to undulate on the stage. People were screaming for him.

Yohji did what he always did when Aya was up, he held up a wad of bills folded around a sucker. It was one of the very few inside jokes the two had. _Here's the money, you sucker! Better you than me!_

Aya grinned at him before slinking back off the stage.

Yohji motioned the guys, it was time to leave. They would have to try to hide amongst the crowd that would be waiting for Aya outside. They had extra security outside that would keep anyone from attacking the dancers in the parking lot, but that wouldn't stop Schwartz.

"What's wrong, Balinese, afraid we're going to hurt him?" Crawford smirked at him as he walked right up to the team.

"Don't worry, I screamed his name, but only to get your attention. I'm not here to compromise what you're doing right now, I'm just letting you know that we still know where you are. And how nice, you brought friends with you. I'll enjoy killing them. But not today. I'm not here to fight today," he walked right past them and kept going.

"Then when?" Yohji caught him by the arm. Crawford shook him off and kept walking. Yohji couldn't make too much of a scene because of the mission.

And here was Aya, walking his way like he always did after the set, taking the sucker out of his mouth and handing it to Yohji with a kiss on the cheek like he always did before heading to his own car.

"Damn," Akio chuckled.

"Yeah," Yohji grinned as he wrapped up the sucker. He always waited until he was home before throwing it out. If he were really a huge fan he would keep it, so throwing it out would look strange to anyone who was looking hard enough.

Yohji wasn't in the least bit surprised when he got home and saw Aya on the roof practicing with his sword.

"Guy's dedicated, gotta give him that," Akio lit up a cigarette.

"Pissed is what he is. He saw Crawford. He's not stupid, he knows what's coming. My biggest worry is the same as his. If Crawford brings Farfarello to one of the shows Aya's dead. He won't have his sword, and Farfarello is faster than he is. The guy will be on Aya with a blade before I can even see him coming. Crawford and Farfarello is the one who stabbed Aya in the eye. The only reason he didn't do both eyes was because one of the others on his team was a little sympathetic. None of them will be sympathetic next time. If they decide to attack we're screwed."

Author's notes: yet another two chapters. I think I'm making up for things because on Halloween I won't be able to post anything, I'll be out doing witchy things. So before Halloween I'll write as many chapters as I can.


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter 21

Aya was glad Yohji had left him alone to practice on the roof for the past two hours. Now he was good and tired. He slid back in through the window. His muscles felt like jelly.

There was hardly any noise downstairs. He put his sword in its sheath before heading down to where he could hear the television. He wanted to seduce Yohji, but his exhausted body had other things in mind as he found the man alone in the living room.

"Feel any better?" Yohji asked as Aya dropped down onto the couch beside him.

"Hn," Aya stretched out on the couch, laying his head in Yohji's lap.

"Just for a little while," Aya whispered. He was just going to doze for ten minutes or so. Yohji's fingers felt so good as they stroked through his hair.

"sleep well," Yohji said very quietly. Aya shut his eyes. All he could dream about over and over was how it had felt when the dagger had pierced his eye. Replaying that fight over and over until he woke to someone shaking him.

"Aya, you okay?" Yohji. Aya sat up, rubbing at his eyes. He looked at the clock across the room. 4:00 am. He'd slept through the night in Yohji's lap. All the other lights were off, which told him that the others had returned and were in bed already. He hoped they hadn't seen him curled up in Yohji's lap.

"Nightmare?" Yohji asked, wiping the hair out of his face.

Aya nodded, climbing to his feet.

"Where's the shower?" Aya asked, stretching so that his back popped. He could imagine how uncomfortable a sleep Yohji had, sitting up without being able to move around and adjust himself throughout the night.

"This way," Yohji took him by the hand and led him up the stairs. Aya winced as the floorboards creaked beneath his feet. There was no sneaking around in this place. They would probably even hear him try to get down the hall to Yohji's room in the middle of the night if he had another nightmare. Yohji usually made those dreams vanish. The only reason he'd had these ones, he was sure, was because he'd seen Crawford at the show. That son of a bitch had even shouted his code name out loud enough for him to hear it on stage.

Aya grinned as Yohji stepped into the bathroom with him. Yohji was fast at work with his clothes, stripping down and then turning on the hot water.

"Bath or shower?" Yohji asked him. Aya stepped out of his pants, pointing at the showerhead as he came up beside him.

Yohji turned on the showerhead, taking Aya by the hand again and leading him under the spray before closing the shower doors.

"No screaming. I'll cover your mouth, kay? That way you don't have to try to make excuses as to why we're in the shower together," Yohji whispered against his lips. Aya leaned into him, loving the feel of Yohji's naked skin against his. He'd wanted to be with Yohji right after the show, until Crawford had pissed him off enough that he had to practice to blow off some steam.

"The guys saw you sleeping in my lap, by the way, I just told them that you fell asleep and happened to land in my lap. They looked skeptical for a second before they shrugged it off and went to bed. They probably won't even remember it, bastards were so pissed drunk."

"I don't want to hear about them," Aya growled, kissing Yohji as hard as he'd wanted to before he'd fallen asleep. Yohji shoved him against the wall, grinning as he pinned Aya's wrists with one hand.

"Seems to me we've been here before," Yohji snickered before dipping his head down to bite at Aya's collarbone.

Aya bit down hard into Yohji's shoulder. He pulled one of his wrists free and reached between them to grasp Yohji's member.

"You don't waste any time," Yohji chuckled.

"Should I?" Aya nipped along Yohji's jaw line before turning in his arms and bracing his hands against the wall.

"Well now, I can't possibly turn that down. Need stretching?" Aya shook his head. He preferred it when it hurt at first, it felt so much better. He gasped as Yohji shoved in hard. One of Yohji's arms snaked around him to cover his mouth. He supposed he couldn't exactly shout like he did with Weiss, not without rousing the entire team and having them come charging in to see if he and Yohji were killing each other.

"Like that?" Aya didn't bother answering. If he didn't like it he would let it be known, and Yohji knew it. Yohji's teeth snapped down onto his neck, making him shout into the muffling hand as he came.

"Still have that affect on you, do I?" Yohji kissed the wound as he pulled away. Aya quickly showered and left Yohji to do the same.

It was time to cook breakfast. If the rest of the team wanted any they had better wake up and get their asses downstairs.

"Mornin, Aya," Akio said, rubbing at his tired eyes as he walked into the kitchen.

"hn," Aya added some seasonings to the omelette.

"If they're eating they better come downstairs," Aya wished he could look at the man out of the corner of his eye, but that was his blind eye. He kept his eyes on the food, shredding some cheese to add in before folding it up.

"I'll go wake everyone. But Aya, you do know work doesn't start until nine, right? The only customers you'll ever get this early in an electronics store are the ones with guns who want to clean you out."

"Should be training anyway," Aya turned to look at him as he slid the omelette onto a plate.

"Yours?" he asked. Akio shrugged and took the plate.

"I suppose you're right, it would be good to practice, don't really want to get rusty. I don't see Yohji practicing at all hours of the night, though."

"Lazy," Aya cracked some more eggs into the pan.

"Hey now, that's not very nice!" Yohji's voice rang out. Aya shot him a grin before continuing to cook.

"Well, it would be nice to practice with the two of you, as long as you promise not to use the business end of that sword it would be nice to hone our skills for when those bastards decide to attack us."

"He'll have to use knives then, probably. Farfarello uses daggers, and Crawford uses his predictions and hand to hand combat skills. Nagi is the one to worry about the most. No amount of training will help you if Nagi freezes your body," Yohji explained.

"That what happened to your eye? You get frozen?" Akio asked, waving Yohji away.

"Wake everyone up, Kudou." Akio said.

"No, Yohji was fighting off Shuldig. We had knocked Nagi out, but Shuldig can get into your head and screw with you. Yohji kept him off me, but I ended up with Farfarello attacking me and Crawford helping him. Crawford pinned me to the ground and kicked me in the head. I woke up to getting a knife in the eye."

"Shit. Sorry, man," Akio reached to pat Aya on the shoulder, but Aya moved out of reach. He didn't mind Akio, but he didn't want the guy touching him unless he was injured.

"Sorry again. Forgot," he smiled as he dug into his food.

"Akio, you harassing him?" one of the guys asked, making light of it. Aya ignored him.

"After watching him kick the shit out of Kudou? He's not a new pet, you know," Aya's shoulders tensed.

"Aya, they didn't mean anything by it. Right guys?" Yohji sounded weary, like he was treading carefully.

"I said he's not, I didn't say that…"

"Quit while you're ahead," Akio warned. Aya was glad, it meant he didn't have to acknowledge them.

"Abyssinian wants us all to train after eating. I, for one, think it's a good idea,"

"Its five in the fucking morning. My brain isn't awake until nine!"

"Oh, well let's just leave a note on the door for Schwartz telling them to come back at nine!" Aya snarled, turning to glare at them.

"Sorry! I forgot what a hardass you were after seeing you all curled up tight in Kudou's lap." Aya slammed the spatula down and launched himself toward the man. Yohji stepped in the way with his hands up.

"Aya, its early. Can we try to get along for a bit? You can kick the shit out of him when we start training. You can fight him first," Yohji promised.

Aya turned around and went back to cooking.

"Just wrote my fucking death warrant, Kudou!" the man complained.

"Its either fight him or have him attack you with anything sharp he might find in the kitchen Take your pick," Yohji chuckled, patting Aya on the shoulder before grabbing a plate for himself.


	22. Chapter 22

Chapter 22

Yohji grinned, watching Aya kick the shit out of the team one by one. They'd been at it for hours now, each one attacking and trying to take him down. Yohji had been training for a while, too, but decided he'd rather watch Aya go to it. The only one that even stood a chance fighting him was Akio, who managed to land a few punches.

Right now the two of them were trading hit for hit. The two of them were actually enjoying themselves. Aya might not have the grin on his face that Akio sported, but Yohji could tell by the way he danced around the man that he was glad to have someone closer to his calibre to fight against finally.

Aya spun around Akio like a dancer, getting behind him and pressing the back of the knives to his throat.

"Point," Yohji shouted with a wink. Aya had won just as Yohji knew he would.

"My turn," Yohji tapped his watch. "Winner gets whatever they want," Yohji challenged.

"And what do you want?" Aya inquired, fixing Yohji with a smouldering look that he was sure no one else noticed.

"I want you to kiss me in front of everyone. And not some cheesy peck on the cheek. I want a real kiss," Yohji winked at him. Aya blushed bright red, making the others chuckle.

"If I win you have to announce that you're a moron to every single person you meet today," Aya attacked, booting him hard in the ribs. Yohji threw his wires at Aya, who used the blades to cut it off his neck before punching him hard in the face. Yohji could only guess how much that hurt Aya with the knives in his hands.

"Get him, Kudou!" One of the guys cheered as Yohji landed a backhand across Aya's cheek.

"Smack you like a bitch," Yohji taunted, loving the fury in Aya's eyes. The man was so easy to bait that it was hilarious.

Aya launched at him, smacking him in the shoulder with the back of one of the knives. Yohji caught Aya's neck in the wires at exactly the same time as Aya pressed the knife to his neck.

"Its a draw. So what now? I think you should both give into each other's demands, its only fair," Akio laughed, running his hands through his blue hair.

"Agree?" Aya asked Yohji with a twitch in his lips that would've been a smile on anyone else.

"You start," Aya challenged.

"Hello, I'm Yohji and I'm a moron. Now get your ass over here and kiss me," Yohji held a hand out, which Aya bypassed and came over to him.

Aya grabbed him by the jaw hard enough that Yohji could hear it creaking in protest. Aya's soft lips crashed against his own and Yohji opened to him, letting him dominate the kiss. The guys were cheering as Aya gave him a good deep kiss. Yohji wrapped his arms around Aya's waist and tried to yank him in closer only to get punched in the stomach.

"I said I would kiss you, not get groped by you," Aya reminded, turning his back on Yohji and walking away.

Yohji shook his head with a laugh. Aya was a damned fine kisser.

"Opening time, I suppose we should get ourselves into the store," Akio announced, grinning at Yohji with a shake of his head.

"I'm surprised he actually agreed to that," Akio wrapped an arm around Yohji's shoulders as they walked.

Yohji tried not to laugh at Aya's bewildered face as he moved around through the store. The man was so out of his element. He hardly used any electronics, he didn't even watch the television unless someone else had turned it to the news or learning channel.

"Need help, Aya?" Akio asked, rolling his eyes at Yohji's snicker. Yohji wanted to leave Aya in the dark for his own amusement, but he supposed that was cruel.

"Why don't you work cash?" Akio asked, leading him over to the register. It was a smart move, I mean even the flower shop had a cash register.

Aya looked relieved as he opened the register and started emptying the envelopes of money into it.

"You're good? Just call if you need any help. I can tell this isn't exactly what you're used to." Aya only nodded in response.

Yohji turned as two girls entered the store. He quickly walked over to greet them.

"Hello, I'm Yohji and I'm a moron, please feel free to let me know if you need any assistance," Yohji kept to his word, turning just in time to catch the smile that Aya tried to hide.

"Liked that, did you?" Yohji walked over to the cash counter and leaned against. Aya was tapping his fingernails against the wood, looking nervous.

"Its going to be fine. it's an electronics store, not a strip club," Yohji had no idea how Aya could go on that stage and be fine and then feel nervous in a store.

"At the strip club no one asks me questions about televisions," Aya growled.

"Yeah, I guess not. Just call me if someone asks you anything." Yohji wanted to kiss him to reassure him, but the guys were right there and the last thing he wanted was for them to tease Aya right now.


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter 23

Aya kept to himself most of the day. Yohji had bought him a black fedora hat to hide his hair under to keep anyone from the strip club from recognizing hated hats, but right now it didn't matter as long as no one recognized him.

Aya didn't want to be recognized by any one. He just wanted to work to keep from having to deal with perverts horning in on him. Of course plenty of perverts wouldn't leave him alone even with a hat on.

"If you're not buying anything then get out!" Aya growled at a man that had been standing there staring at him, trying to make conversation with him about his likes and dislikes.

"Now don't be like that, baby. I just want to get to know you, and the customer is always right." Aya caught the man's hand when it came toward his face. The man had been about to try to caress his cheek.

"Leave!" Aya snarled.

"Aya, be nice to our customers," Akio smirked at him, walking over to the man that had been harassing Aya for the past twenty minutes.

"Can I help you, sir?" Akio was flirting with the guy! What the hell! Was this place filled with carbon copy Yohjis?

"Red here doesn't want to give me the time of day. You should really teach that bitch how to talk to customers," the man gave Aya a toothy grin.

"Customers buy things!" Aya started to come around the counter to remove the man himself, but Akio motioned him to stay still.

"You sure I can't help you with anything?" Akio slid his hand up the man's arm.

"I'm fine!" The man stormed out.

"Well hell! That always works! I must be losing my touch," Akio pouted before grinning at Aya, telling him that Akio had known exactly how the man would react.

"You sure you want to work here? You don't have to work at all. Weiss is welcome to our company whenever they want without paying a cent. You can kick back until there's a mission."

"There's going to be a mission tonight, but that doesn't matter, Aya would never ever kick back and relax if he wasn't forced to," Yohji said before Aya could utter a word.

"You talk for him now? He does have a voice even though he might not use it often," Akio interrupted, watching Aya and waiting for an answer.

"I am not lazy," Aya said, moving around the counter to start cleaning up and organizing the electronics. Didn't these men know how to stay organized? This place was filthy, how could anyone ever shop here?

"Back to perfectionism, eh 'Red'?" Akio teased using the name the pervert had used on him.

"Slobs," Aya said as he grabbed a broom and started sweeping the floors. It was going to need to be mopped and waxed to make it look nice.

Once he was finished sweeping he started to clean the windows.

"You're impossible," Yohji snickered, grabbing him in a bear hug.

"Let go of me!" Aya growled, elbowing him hard and ending up with both of them falling to the floor.

"Heavy bastard," Yohji gasped as Aya climbed off of him.

"Could you tell me what you have in televisions?" Aya sprung into action, kicking in the direction of Nagi's voice.

His body froze. Shit! He could feel the sweat dripping down his spine as he fought against the hold.

"If you try to fight I'll break your bones," Nagi warned.

"Schwartz," Yohji shouted to the guys so that they would know what was going on.

"I should make you follow me right into our place, chain you up like the animal you are and let Farfarello play with you, but I won't do it just yet. Consider yourself lucky...or perhaps very unlucky. Crawford has other plans for you. You're going to wish you had never touched Shuldig," Nagi droned before turning on his heel and leaving.

Aya collapsed the second the hold was released. He was exhausted from trying to struggle.

Yohji was running to his side, checking his forehead for a fever, though why Yohji would think he would get a fever from a fight he had no idea.

"Moron," Aya panted, letting Yohji help him up. Yohji's arms were so warm as they closed around him, helping him walk.

"Sorry, guys, you might want to close shop for today in case they come back. We can't exactly get into a fight with them in public no matter what Aya seems to think."

Aya wanted to smack him. Of course they could start a fight. They couldn't exactly let Schwartz torment them day in and day out, waiting for them to really attack.

"I know what you're thinking, and I wish I could fight them, too, but we're at a disadvantage. We're the ones trying to hide our identities, not them. If Weiss is compromised, or even if these guys are compromised that is a huge loss that Kritiker can't afford, especially with them running around. We have to bide our time and wait for them to attack even if we hate the idea!"

Aya wasn't going to justify that with an answer. If they showed up he was going to fight even if no one else would back him up.

"We have to have each other's backs, guys. We can't be fighting each other on this. We're going inside to talk about our options," Akio said. Aya knew that it was non-negotiable.

"If you two can't agree to those terms Aya is going back to Weiss. We can't have our team divided by you two. I'm not being an asshole, I'm being a realist. We've never had fallings out like you two did. We've never had to worry about a teammate not having our backs. We can't afford to let you two ruin that because you're arguing." Aya hated to admit it but the guy was right. This was a team, not a kindergarten. Aya nodded in agreement.

Author's notes: Thanks chinchan for your review. =)


	24. Chapter 24

Chapter 24

Aya was on the phone before any of them had even sat down to talk. Yohji, like everyone else, assumed he was talking to Kritiker, that is until they heard Aya giving orders.

"We need someone to lay down wax evenly, and I will check to make sure it is done properly. Also, I heard that you do window replacements. I will need seven new 21 inch windows and new trim. Do you do doors? Can you point me in the direction of someone who knows how to do it properly? Yes, I will be here to let them in. It needs to be done right away." Yohji grabbed the phone out of Aya's hand before the man could dial a number to order a new door for the shop.

"How about priorities, Aya?" Yohji snickered, setting the phone back in its cradle.

"This is a priority if they are going to run a business. The flowershop never looked this bad, and that is because I kept on top of everything. You wouldn't know a clean floor if it…"

"I bet Ken's already dragged his dirty soccer cleats all over your pretty floors, Aya. Just wait until you have to go back to Weiss," Yohji laughed at the bewildered look on Aya's face.

"Its not my concern anymore," Aya looked down at his hands, and Yohji knew something was very wrong. He wasn't saying it wasn't his concern anymore because he would be gone for a month or two.

"Aya, you can't quit. Are you insane? Where will you go? You going to strip for a career?" Yohji grabbed him by the shoulders and gave him a hard shake. Aya said nothing, he just sat there and let Yohji shake him. Okay, that didn't work. Yohji smacked him so hard across the face that the others winced.

"I'll do what I have to. I'm not a pawn and I won't play their games. If I go back then I won't be able to be near you anymore, and that's something I won't put up with. Without you there's only blood. Its all I can see. I'm so tainted, but you're tainted too, and you don't judge me for it." Aya didn't fight as Yohji wrapped his arms around him and pulled him up against his chest. Aya was full of surprises today. Yohji ran a hand through his hair, trying to ignore the others in the room. If Aya remembered that there were others in the room the man was going to go ballistic.

"Schwartz did this to us, Aya. Once we kill them maybe Kritiker will let us both go back. Where else can we go?"

"You're both welcome to stay here," Akio interrupted. Yohji was surprised, yet again, when Aya didn't jump out of his arms in embarrassment. Instead Aya slowly drew away, looking back down at his hands.

"We're happy to have both of you, even if you are a pain in the ass, Fujimiya," that had Aya looking up at the man. Yohji was glad, he didn't like seeing Aya so troubled.

"Now, can we get down to business?" Akio wasn't being overbearing or even impatient, he was giving them an out to change the subject. Aya nodded, turning to face him.

"What are we going to do about Schwartz?"

"Find them and kill them," one of the guys said. Aya shot the man a glare.

"Gee, I hadn't thought of that, what a genius plan," Yohji snorted. "Oh, wait, that's right, we don't even know where to start to look for them. Maybe we should check the yellow pages."

Yohji caught Aya rolling his eyes at his theatrics, a twitch in his lips.

"Was that a smile?" Yohji teased, grinning from ear to ear as Aya blushed.

"Aya, any ideas on how to find them? I mean you seem to be able to find them whenever you want," Yohji hated putting all attention on Aya, but he knew he was right.

"If I go out alone I will find them, but Crawford sees the future, he'll know if all of you are waiting around. If I offer myself to them they always come. But then again I'm used to dealing with Shuldig."

"And without Shuldig around they'll kill you because he always kept you alive for mind games. I'm not about to let you sacrifice yourself even if it does mean we'll find them," Yohji took one of Aya's hands in his own and squeezed it.

"Put a bug on me. He might not see that coming."

"Not going to happen. Any other ideas?" Yohji looked around at all of their grim faces.

"Abyssinian, is this your final decision? You are capable of taking care of yourself, I believe this to be true. If this is your decision then far be it from me to deny you," Akio held up a hand to shush the outrage of the rest of the team.

"We don't just give our own to the enemy even if the hardass thinks he can handle it! That's not the way we work, Sphynx!" One of the guys shouted furiously.

"He is not doing this, that is final!" Yohji growled, glaring at Aya. How could the man even think of doing something this stupid? He had lost an eye last time, did he want to lose the other? Or worse, die?

"I can handle it, Yohji. I'm not…"

"Not one of the women I used to date, I know that! And I wish you'd quit using that analogy! Christ! And no, you can't fucking handle it! You lost an eye last time against two of them, what are you going to do against three? When Nagi freezes your body are you going to enjoy being their bitch? Because that's all this is going to do. Its not going to give us any advantage. If anything it will put us at a disadvantage because we'll be down one. God, I can't believe you are such a bullheaded idiot!" Yohji screamed. He knew he was making a scene, but he could feel his heart pounding, feeling like Aya was ripping it right out! If they agreed to this Aya would die and Yohji would be nothing but an empty shell. He'd felt so empty for so long after Asuka had died, if he lost Aya there would be nothing left for him. Even revenge wouldn't feel good. No, he wasn't even sure if he would get revenge, he didn't even know if he would survive it.

"Balinese, please calm down. We are here to discuss, not throw fits. That goes for the rest of you, too. I am the only one right now thinking clearly. Even you, Abyssinian, are too clouded by your own helplessness, I am not about to let you die for nothing. I think we need to let them come to us. Who is in agreement?"

Yohji raised his hand along with all of the rest of the team, everyone except for Aya, who stood up and left the room. Yohji could almost feel the anger rolling off him in waves.

He shook his head as he listened to Aya letting the cleaning and repairmen into the shop, already giving them orders.

"Thanks," Yohji blew out a breath.

"I didn't make this decision to take your side, Yohji, I made it because it was the only decision that made any sense. Of course it will be your job to keep him in line and make sure he doesn't do it anyway," Akio patted him on the arm.

Shit, he was right. If Yohji didn't watch him like a hawk Aya would run off.

Author's notes: Thanks for the review, bat! =)


	25. Chapter 25

Chapter 25

Aya had about had it with Yohji constantly following him around for the past week like he was going to bolt. Of course he was going to run, so he supposed Yohji had every right to be suspicious. Yohji hadn't been able to follow him at 'work' at the strip club.

Aya waited in the darkness, dressed in mission gear with his sword drawn. He'd seen Farfarello in the audience tonight, so it was a good thing that he'd brought everything along. Crawford had probably seen that he was going to try to find them, that was the only reason that freak would be in the audience waiting for him.

"Going somewhere, Aya?" Sphynx was suddenly beside him. Aya slapped a hand over Sphynx's mouth, he could put up with the shit later, right now he was tracking Farfarello.

He'd followed him down the street and was now preparing to attack. Farfarello, obviously knowing that he was being followed, turned around and headed back toward them.

Aya shoved Sphynx into the alley. They couldn't have this fight out in the open. Sphynx was on his cell calling the others to come as back up.

Aya ducked just in time to avoid the dagger aimed for his face. He booted Farfarello hard in the ribs to make him back up. Farfarello smirked as he managed to stab Aya's hand, making him drop the sword. The man was on him suddenly, grabbing him by the neck and slamming him back against the brick wall. Aya fell, coughing.

Sphynx was there suddenly, attacking from behind, wrapping one arm around Farfarello's neck and dragging him off Aya, giving him a second to grab his sword and get up.

Farfarello grabbed Sphynx's arms and threw him off.

"Fun's over for tonight, Farfarello. There will be too many kitties for just the two of us," Crawford smirked, opening his car door.

Aya launched himself at Farfarello, kicking him in the small of his back to send him to the ground.

Crawford was out of the car with a gun in hand.

"I gave you a chance to call it a night, Abyssinian, remember that!" Crawford snapped, firing three times. One of them grazed the side of his head, the second would've pierced his side if he weren't wearing Kevlar, and the third went right by him. He turned, watching Sphynx drop. Then he felt it, Farfarello's knife, slashing down his back from his shoulder blade down to his waist.

He collapsed, only to get booted in the head. He could feel Farfarello rolling him over onto his back. Shit! His vision was blurry, but not so blurry that he couldn't see the dagger coming at his eye.

"If you want to hurt him then bring him with us. Hurry it up! They're coming this way!" Crawford was shouting at Farfarello.

Aya reached, he knew his sword was nearby, but where the hell was it? It didn't matter. He'd prepared for this. He'd known that he couldn't beat Farfarello one on one, so he'd taken an extreme approach.

"Run, you idiot!" Crawford shouted, climbing back into the car. Aya reached up and grabbed Farfarello around the waist and yanked him in so close that their bodies were pressed flush against each other. The freak obviously thought it was for other reasons, because he lowered the blade.

Aya pressed the detonator to the bomb he had strapped to his chest. He didn't want to die, he'd covered most of his body in layers of Kevlar in hopes of surviving, but he was a realist. Even if this didn't kill him it was going to do serious damage.

Everything went red with agony, and then it was gone.


	26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26

Yohji's heart stopped when he saw the explosion in the alley. He didn't have to be a genius to know exactly what he would find when he rounded that corner with the rest of the team.

"Abyssinian, you psychotic son of a bitch, you alive?" Akio rasped, sitting up and putting pressure on the shot that was way too close to his heart.

Aya wasn't moving. Yohji let the rest of the team run to Akio, he shoved what was left of Farfarello off of Aya and looked down at the redhead.

Aya looked like shit, covered in filth. Farfarello's body had blocked most of Aya's body, but his chest was shredded to hell from where the stupid ass had detonated some sort of bomb.

He checked Aya for signs of life and came up empty. This wasn't happening! Yohji punched him as hard as he could in the face, tears straining his eyes.

"You stupid son of a bitch!" Yohji screamed, starting CPR. If Aya survived Yohji was going to find every wound on him and dig his fingers into each one to make it clear that he was a stupid ass!

An ambulance pulled up, blocking everything off as the EMT's came running into the alley. They pulled Aya out of Yohji's care and shoved him into the back of the vehicle, doing the same with Akio. Kritiker's doctors were the best out there.

The second Akio had called for back up Yohji had called Kritiker's emergency crew to send an ambulance. He'd known that Aya would be hurt, but he hadn't expected this shit. He was glad he'd at least brought his car to the location Akio had instructed. He and the others clamoured into the car.

"Your team always pull this shit? No wonder we're always given the minor missions, fuck! If that asshole survives I'm going to…"

"You will do nothing," Yohji interrupted. He wasn't about to let any of the team crap on the effort it had taken Aya to pull something like this off. He had to admit that he couldn't crap on that either. Aya had been desperate. From the position they had been in it was obvious that he would've lost the other eye if he hadn't done something, and Yohji, once again, wasn't there to keep him safe.

Yohji pulled up in the hospital parking lot, not waiting for the others as he ran inside.

"Fujimiya, Ran," Yohji was almost shouting at the receptionist. She looked it up on the computer.

"He's still critical, he can't have any visitors yet."

"What about Akio Kansaki?" Yohji tapped his fingers on the desk, which just made the woman annoyed with him.

"Room 209 down that hall and to the left," she pointed him in the direction. Yohji nodded to the guys, who followed him in.

"Hey," Akio waved at them, then hissed at the pain in his chest from the movement.

"How you feeling?" Yohji asked, wanting a cigarette badly.

"Like I've had the shit beaten out of me. I'm sorry about Abyssinian, that freak was too strong for us. He was smacking us around like we were children. I wasn't even landing any punches, the best I could do was pull him off Abyssinian when he went down, but that just ended up with me getting the shit kicked out of me. He was going to put out the other eye, but then Abyssinian detonated. That crazy fuck! I'm so sorry. I know you loved him. I wasn't good back up for him. Shit! I don't know what to say," Yohji reached over and patted him on the arm.

"Nothing to say. You did your best. Aya had already realized that he might not be any match for Farfarello and he'd been planning this or he wouldn't have had any bombs on him. Aya doesn't usually use bombs, he likes to kill up close so that he can see their faces as they die. He obviously knew that wasn't going to work this time and was tired of waiting for that psychopath to come for him. Farfarello's had it in for him for a while now, I'm just glad Aya could kill him before he would've done the two things that freak has wanted to do to Aya for a while now. Aya would rather die than live with the shame. There was nothing you could've done that would've changed anything. You called us, that was the best thing you could do, at least now he's in the hospital where he might be able to recover. I was told they're working on him right now," Yohji turned his head to look at the rest of the team. Their faces were grim. They had probably seen nothing quite like this before when it came to damage to their own members.

"Why did that freak want Aya so badly?" Akio asked, looking like part of him would rather not know.

"When Schwartz had Aya as a captive they warped his mind into thinking that he was one of theirs, and Farfarello apparently decided Aya was his boyfriend. I talked to Aya and he says he had no clue Farfarello was courting him until the guy kissed him. Aya hadn't thought anything of it, he was so confused and pissed off, so he let him. But when Farfarello tried to take things further Aya fought him off and ran like hell. Farfarello obviously still thought Aya was his. He wanted to blind Aya, maybe to keep him from running away again or something, and then he wanted to…well, I'm sure you can guess," Yohji didn't need to spell it out for him, he could see it in the widening of Akio's eyes. Even the other guys shuddered at the idea.

"Woulda blown myself up, too," Akio conceded.

"Not me, I would've fought until it happened, then put up with the pain so that I could find a way to escape," Yohji said. It was true, too. He wasn't the self-sacrificing type.

"Help me up. I don't want to stay in here all night. I need a smoke," Akio grumbled. Yohji let the others help him up. Yohji was too tall, he'd end up hurting him if he tried to support him.

"You guys should go. I'm staying in the waiting room until Aya…if Aya wakes up. I can't just go," Yohji shook his head.

How had all this gone to hell in one night? Aya was supposed to get in that damned car and come straight home! Instead he'd…he'd been that bullheaded idiot that Yohji had fallen in love with.

"We wait as a team or we don't wait at all," one of the others said. Yohji nodded. He was surprised. They thought of Aya and himself as part of the team even though the two were most likely only temporary.

"So you love him?" One of the guys asked. Yohji nodded. He wasn't about to lie about it. He'd hidden it, but he hadn't exactly lied.

Author's notes: I had to do two chapters here because the first one would've been way too short. Hope you like. =)


	27. Chapter 27

Chapter 27

The first thing Aya was aware of was pain. His eyes shot open. He looked around at the sterile white hospital room. He well remembered why he would be here, but couldn't fathom how he'd survived.

With a groan he forced himself to sit up, feeling his skin tight against both his back and his chest. Omi and Ken could be heard down the hall talking with Akio and Yohji. The others were talking, but not loud enough for Aya to make out a thing.

First thing was first, he was getting out of here. There was no way in hell he was waiting in a hospital for Crawford and Nagi to show up. He was better off back at the Flowershop, only this time he was going to merge the two teams so that they might stand a chance when they were under attack. That way he wouldn't have to do something like this again. He was pretty sure Yohji was going to be pissed with him.

He grimaced as he looked down at the stitches across his chest. He looked like shit. The only thing that probably kept him alive was the Kevlar, and the only thing that kept Akio alive was when Aya had pulled Farfarello closer to make sure he killed the bastard. He was wearing nothing but a pair of hospital pants, probably so that his wounds wouldn't stick to the shirt.

Aya slid to the edge of the bed and forced himself to stand. It hurt like hell, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle, at least until he was home, and then he was going to sleep it off, and maybe sneak into Yohji's painkillers.

"Abyssinian, you might want to take it easy," a woman said. Aya turned to face Manx, who was frowning at him.

"What are you doing here?" Aya growled, turning and continuing his walk down the hall.

"I'm making a report on your injuries. Persia's orders," she said very quietly.

"Good, tell him I'm fine." Aya wanted to shove her to keep her from walking with him. She was spying on him for Persia! He didn't need to put up with that.

"Aya! What the hell! Get your ass back in that room!" Ken shouted, racing to his side and grabbing his arm to wrap around his shoulders.

"I'm fine. We're leaving," Aya stated. There was no room for argument, just a few murmurs of 'shit!' going around the room.

"if you ever pull a stunt like that again I'm going to kill you myself," Yohji shouted at him once they were outside.

"If I ever have to pull a stunt like that again you won't get a chance to," Aya reminded him, letting Ken help him into the back.

"We're all staying together at the Kitten's House," Aya stated. No one was arguing.

They rode the entire way in silence. Aya shrugged Ken off when the boy tried to help him walk to the doors. He wasn't about to let them baby him. He couldn't afford to take any down time.

"Aya, why the hell would you do something like that without telling us?" Yohji finally asked.

"Because you would've tried to stop me. Bad enough that he ended up with me," Aya jerked a thumb in Akio's direction.

"Hey, had I known you were going to blow yourself up, trust me, I would've been anywhere else. But it looked like you needed help, so I helped," Akio's face looked strained.

"Where were you hit?" Aya asked, remembering Akio going down.

"Chest, but the bullet came out clean. Just barely missed my heart. You could say I'm a lucky guy," Akio winked at him.

"I could say you're an idiot to follow me when you don't know what I'm trying to do," Aya started walking up the stairs. He rolled his eyes as everyone followed him. They weren't about to let him just walk away. Shit!

"And what were you trying to do, Aya? Other than get yourself killed!" Yohjii shouted. Aya came to a halt on the stairs.

"Did I take him with me or is he still alive, too?" Aya turned his head to look at Yohji.

"He's dead. Just enough of him left to have you trapped underneath him."

"Then there's your answer. We have two down, two to go. We can't afford to let our guards down now. They know I'm injured, they should attack soon." Aya wished they didn't have so many damned stairs. He didn't remember there being this many before, or maybe that was because he was exhausted.

"Omi stitched up your coat, by the way. You should thank him. We thought you were dead for sure, but just incase Omi fixed it up for you," Yohji caught his arm, nearly making him fall.

"Thank you," Aya said in Omi's direction. "Let go of me!" He hissed at Yohji, who was glaring at him. Everyone else was backing off.

"What exactly are you going to do right now?" Yohji asked, coming so close to him that Aya could feel his breath against is face.

"I'm going to train. I can't get rusty," Aya paused, looking Yohji in the eye. "Unless you have something you'd rather I be doing?" Aya brushed their lips together, grinning.

"You can barely walk and you want to screw? You're impossible, and you're going to rip your stitches! How are you going to heal if you keep ripping them?" Yohji shoved him far enough away that he couldn't tease anymore.

"If you don't want to then let me go so that I can train. I need to…do something." anything really, to get the stress out. He should be calm, but he found himself even more frustrated than he'd been before he'd killed Farfarello.

Author's notes: Thanks chinchan for the review. =)


	28. Chapter 28

Chapter 28

Yohji had to listen to the other team say stupid things like 'no wonder we aren't up to par with Weiss if you guys pull that shit all the time'. He was glad to have another team on board, and he really liked these guys, but the whole 'hero worship' thing wasn't what he needed to hear right now.

He'd told the guys to go back and grab their belongings, because they were now residents of the Kitten's House until Schwartz was finished. Kritiker had agreed to it as well, thinking that merging the two teams was beneficial when they were in such bad shape. And of course the fact that Akio had helped Aya would put him on Schwartz's shit list.

"Aya and I will take first shift in the morning. We all know that he's going to be up at the crack of dawn like usual, so at least if we make him work on the flowers it will keep him busy so that he doesn't decide to go and play with his sword on the roof. The more we can keep him busy with non-strenuous things the more he'll have time to heal without him realizing we're doing this. Okay?" Omi had nodded. Ken hadn't looked too happy, but he'd agreed. He just hoped that the other team understood to stay out of Aya's way. They were all looking at him in a new light, as more than just the guy with an attitude that had beaten the shit out of Yohji. They were beginning to understand his cold determination and skills. They were getting that he was what Weiss stood for, it was why he was their leader. Yohji would kill without blinking, and do a damned fine job of it, but he wasn't the self-sacrificing type. Ken would've ended up dead, plain and simple, and Omi, well, Omi was good from far away, but up close he was more the team mascot.

Yohji said his goodnights to everyone. They'd already agreed to split up the rooms two to each room. It was the only way it would work, and seemings that Omi always stayed in Ken's room and Aya always stayed in Yohji's it wouldn't matter if the other team stayed in the spare rooms.

He smirked at the sight at the top of the stairs. Aya hadn't even made it out to the balcony doors, he was asleep standing up with his sword in hand.

"Stupid ass," Yohji took him by the arm and led him, still asleep, to bed. Aya only woke with a hiss when Yohji accidentally lay him down on his back.

"Sorry, babe, I didn't mean to," Yohji lay down next to him, pulling Aya to curl up against him.

"I'm pissed as hell with you, but you did a good job. I never would've had the guts to blow myself up, just promise me you won't do it again. Without you there's nothing," Yohji kissed the top of his head.

"Hn," Aya muttered, nuzzling in. Yohji smirked, it was almost a yes. Probably the closest thing he would get to one.

Yohji closed his eyes drifting off. His dreams were filled with nothing but the explosion over and over. Aya's dead eyes looking up at him, the blood coming out of the side of his mouth. For all intents and purposes Aya had been dead for a little while. It was the longest moments of his life, even longer than when _she _had died.

Yohji woke with a shout. Something felt damned good! He looked up at Aya, who was smirking down at him, straddling his hips. Goddamn, how had Aya positioned himself just right without Yohji sensing a thing?

"You were having a nightmare," Aya said, riding him hard.

"So you decided to fuck me? Wow, I should have nightmares more often." That got a chuckle from Aya. Yohji grasped Aya's hips and started his own rhythm.

"Can you two at least try to be quiet? You woke everyone up!" Ken shouted from the other side of the door.

"If you had Aya doing _that _to you, you'd shout too, now go away!" Yohji shouted with a laugh.

"Doing what, this?" Aya leaned down and bit the side of Yohji's neck, making him shout again.

"Omi can hear you too, innocent ears and all that. What about team Laufer? They sure as hell don't need to hear you two!" Ken wasn't going to let up, he could tell.

Yohji came hard, filling Aya as Aya came.

"Pests," Aya hissed, climbing off Yohji and making his way to the door, stark naked.

"Go away!" Aya snapped as he opened the door. Everyone was out in the hallway staring at him like he'd grown another head.

"Guys, really, you need to tone it down a bit. And Aya, with your injuries do you really think you should strain yourself like that?" Omi elbowed Ken, trying to get him to shut up.

Aya grabbed Ken by the throat and slammed him against the wall hard enough to make him choke. He might be hurt, but he was getting his strength back.

"I don't think you need to worry about what Yohji and I do behind closed doors. If you don't like to hear then buy some earplugs or go fuck Omi!" Aya snarled, releasing him.

"Any other objections?" Aya looked over team Laufer.

"None at all, gorgeous. I'm all for hearing sexy sounds down the hall. Just makes me horny, so if you don't mind me I'm going to go and fuck Shin into oblivion," Akio winked at him, grabbing Shin by the arm. The idiot followed Akio with a skip in his step. Good, maybe Shin would leave him the hell alone.

"Sorry," Omi had tears in his eyes.

"Go to bed," Aya said in a slightly softer voice. He wasn't going to hurt Omi, who had probably only followed Ken out into the hall. Omi didn't mind hearing them, he knew that. The boy just glad that the two of them were happy together.

"I'm glad you and Yohji are together again," Omi said, wiping a tear from his eyes. Ah, so that's why he was teary, because he was happy.

"Bombay, no mission reports?" Aya needed to make sure, and Omi was happy whenever he could give any sort of information, it made him feel useful.

"None. I think Persia has agreed that we need to prepare for Schwartz. Yohji signed you up for the morning shift. Laufer is going to help, they need to know their way around the shop." Omi said, and then did something that shocked the hell out of Aya, he grabbed him around the waist in a hug before running down the stairs. Apparently he'd scared the kid when he'd been hospitalized.

"See what your stunt did to everyone? You should've seen the grim faces in the waiting room. They even warned us to stop cussing because it was getting to the other people in the waiting room. We were all scared shitless. We even had to explain to Laufer a million times that Weiss doesn't always pull that shit. We had to explain to them that you're an extremist. Now not only are they scared shitless of you, but they're trying to take note of every little thing you do because they think you should train them. If you decide to train them you sure as hell aren't doing it alone, because we don't need a team of suicide bombers," Yohji kissed the side of his neck, making Aya shudder.

"I'm not a…"

"Yes you are, now get that sexy ass back in bed, I think you and I aren't done playing. Don't worry, babe, I'll do all the work," Yohji nipped at his ear.

"Hn," okay, that clearly was a 'like hell you will'. Yohji grinned and led him back into the room, careful of his back and chest.

"How about some of this?" Yohji kissed down Aya's chest. Aya caught him by the arms and dragged him back up before he could take him in his mouth.

"What do you want to do then?" Yohji asked, brushing their lips together.

Aya wrapped his arms tightly around Yohji and just held him. This was nice. He and Aya didn't usually have moments like this where they could just hold each other without it leading to sex. He was going to hang on for as long as the redhead let him. Screw going back to sleep, for once he was glad to be wide awake at two in the morning.

Author's notes: Sorry, Omi lovers, the kids a cutie and a genius, but I didn't find him very useful in hand to hand combat. He kind of either needed help or fought from a distance. Don't kill me, kay?


	29. Chapter 29

Chapter 29

Aya was up at the crack of dawn as usual, but this time it was the smell of food that had woken him. It was strange to have anyone cook that had food that actually smelled even close to as good as his own. It was a pleasant change.

He took a quick shower with Yohji and then headed down into the kitchen. He had no idea who had started cooking, the guys were all in the other room talking about strategy.

Yohji grinned, turning Aya around and pinning him to the fridge with a fierce kiss that had Aya growling into his mouth.

"Well, I never expected to hear sounds like that coming from that hardass!" Shin snickered, coming into the kitchen behind Akio, who stirred the food.

"What time does the flower shop open?" Akio asked, winking at Aya, who blushed furiously at having been caught making out in the kitchen.

"Six, but that's only because sometimes teenager boys like to buy flowers for their girlfriends before school. Especially right now because Valentines day is coming up." Yohji explained so that Aya didn't have to say a word.

"You eating, Aya?" Akio asked, getting the plates ready.

Aya nodded. He wasn't about to get growled at by Yohji for not eating. Not right now. He let Akio dish out a good sized portion onto his plate with a nod of thanks before sitting down amongst Laufer.

"Well, Omi said we should be on shift this morning with all of you so that we can learn the ropes. Shin is going to help us learn, too, so that we're not more than you can handle in the clueless region." Akio handed the next plate to Yohji.

Aya was most definitely satisfied with the meal. He hadn't expected any of the team to be even a little bit domestic. But then again he was pretty sure they hadn't expected that of him, so it was only fair.

Aya polished off his plate quickly before getting ready to open shop. Yohji, annoyingly enough, was at his side immediately, helping him into the green apron so that he wouldn't rip his stitches.

"I'm not a kid, you know, I can dress myself," Aya growled, even though he knew it would have no affect on the man.

"Yeah, but I like to take care of you every now and then. Come on, at least let me pretend to be helpful, for my pride's sake," Yohji kissed his cheek.

"We should probably start with the roses, right? It is Wednesday, they should have been delivered yesterday, and Ken has no idea how to remove the thorns without hurting himself, the tool," Yohji snorted, dragging Aya into the shop. The others followed close behind.

"Gently apply pressure to the sides of the thorns and you can slip them right off," Aya explained as he opened the boxes of roses.

"Its actually not very hard," Aya showed them, it was easier when the roses were still young, but they couldn't exactly go and clip them early, no one would buy baby roses.

He handed a rose to each of the men, allowing them to try.

"Shit! Stupid things, why do roses even have these things? Its not like they can even protect themselves from animals…"

"They help absorb the water," Aya explained, interrupting Akio's rant. It took them two hours to go through all of the crates of roses, an hour longer than usual. At least when they opened shop there weren't too many people showing up, at least until the swarm of girls interrupted the silence that had been comfortable in the shop.

Aya rolled his eyes at their comments about how they were so glad to see Aya and Yohji back in the store, and how hot were the other guys, too! Once again they were praying to them and talking about their likes and dislikes.

"If you're not buying anything then leave!" Aya growled.

"Careful around Aya, girls, the Klutz fell down a flight of stairs, he's injured," Yohji explained to them. Now the girls were grabbing pots out of his hands, determined to help him out. It was endearing that they wanted to help him, but it was also annoying as hell.

"Let me get that, Aya," it was Sakura. Aya nodded with a partial smile, handing the pot to her. She was so kind, and looked so much like Aya-Chan. He couldn't say no to her.

"I haven't seen you lately. I brought you lunch every day incase you would show up. I made you rice and tofu and a lot of other things. I hope you like them." She smiled, taking him by the arm and leading him toward where she had set down the boxed lunch.

"Er, thank you," Aya said awkwardly. Everyone was staring at him, was it really that strange for him to be nice to a girl? He supposed so. He usually did snap at them and tell them to get lost.

"How have you been?" He asked, using the squirt bottle to mist the flowers, just enough to keep them damp.

"I won the race at track and field. I got first place," she leaned up and kissed his cheek, making him blush like crazy.

"I heard you fell in love with Yohji, I'm so happy for you," she gave him a light hug, careful of his injuries.

"Yohji is a good person," Aya admitted. Sakura was grinning from ear to ear. He had expected her to be upset. She'd always had a crush on him. Instead she looked overjoyed.

"I want two dozen roses," she said cheerfully. Aya nodded, bringing her the roses and letting Akio ring them up.

"Happy early Valentines day!" She said happily, handing Yohji a dozed and Aya the other dozen.

"I've been sponsored in this City's race team. I've also had time to get a part time job, so I wanted to get you something to thank you. I figure that I owe Yohji roses, too, for taking care of you! We should celebrate!" Okay, now she was getting ahead of herself.

"We really can't, we have a lot of orders to do because of the holiday, but thank you!" Yohji said, saving Aya from having to come up with something. Aya nodded at that comment, feeling like he'd dodged a bullet.

"Well, another time then! Oh! Look at the time! School starts in twenty minutes!" She shouted, racing out of the store!

Aya exhaled, setting the boxed lunch aside and starting to work on making a beautiful wreath.

"Aya has an admirer!" Akio snickered.

"Yeah, she's been coming around for a long time. Aya saved her life," Yohji explained. "She'll never leave him alone now. For some reason though, he doesn't seem to mind here like he does the others."

Aya paused as his eyes lit on a small box on the counter with a white rose. He opened it up, his hands starting to shake.

We can come and go as we please. Try to stop us!

That was Nagi's handwriting.

Aya handed it to Yohji, his eyes narrowing. This wasn't good If they could come in while the entire group was there and not have left a single trace.


	30. Chapter 30

Chapter 30

Yohji didn't feel the need to be alarmed. They already knew Schwartz could pull crap like this. Aya was worried because it seemed more like something Shuldig would do, even though Yohji had explained over and over that they knew Shuldig was dead. Aya had it in his head that Crawford had been here, not Nagi, despite the handwriting. Crawford would know all about what Shuldig would've done, so he was doing it in his place. Whatever.

Right now he was busy watching Aya put Sakura's roses back on the shelf to sell to someone else. The man hated receiving gifts. He'd even given Yohji the boxed lunch.

"How long has the answering machine been blinking?" Aya asked. Yohji had no idea, he hadn't even looked at it. Yohji shrugged and hit the play button.

_Ran? If you're there than please pick up. I'm at the airport. I'll stop in at ten. I really want to see you. I've been worried. See you tomorrow!_

Shit, it was Aya-Chan! Oh, this day was getting better and better.

"Who's Ran?" Akio asked, scratching his head.

"That would be Aya's real name. Only call him that when his sister's around. She'll get confused if we call him by her name." Yohji explained despite the glare of death Aya sent his way.

"She can't come here!" Aya snapped.

"Well, its not like she left a phone number or anything," Yohji didn't know what else to say. He wanted Aya-Chan safe, but he also knew that her presence would calm Aya down a bit. The man was way too stressed out lately. I mean there was good reason to be stressed, but it wasn't going to help him in the end.

"I know her phone number," Aya snarled, grabbing the phone out of its cradle and dialling.

"Aya-Chan? You can't come here, I…yes, but…can't we…okay," Aya hung up so hard that the girls in the shop went silent.

"What time's she coming over?" Yohji asked. Aya had such a soft spot for his cute little sister.

"Two hours," Aya went back to the wreath he was working on.

"Word of advice, guys, don't hit on Aya's little sister or you will so be on his shit list."

Two hours, and then three rolled around. Yohji could tell by how tense Aya's muscles were that the man was getting uneasy.

"Aya, I'm sure she's just stuck in traffic or something. She'll be here any minute now." Yohji kissed his cheek, grinning as the teenage girls giggled. The pests had really taken to Laufer, too, fishing for any information that they could get, especially on Akio. They already had info on Shin.

Aya was trying to get a hold of her on her cell, but there was no answer. Yohji wanted to take the phone away and just hold Aya for a moment, just to calm him down. But he knew if he tried Aya would beat the shit out of him.

Aya put the phone back in its cradle as the doors opened. Crawford walked in, looking smug.

"Well, I must say, Aya, that you are a rare gem in your family. Your sister is cute, but she looks awful next to your beauty. Too bad that she doesn't have your fighting skill. She was so easy to catch. All I had to do was hit her once and she was crying, letting me pull her into the backseat where Nagi held her down. I think its only fair that I kill your most precious person. You already killed mine," Crawford, strolled right up to Aya like nothing at all was wrong.

Yohji pushed Aya behind him. Aya might be pissed about it, but Yohji couldn't let Crawford have his way.

"I suppose I should be kinder than you are. I will give you a chance to find her. We will leave clues for you, to watch you try to figure out exactly where she is and what we're doing to her. The longer you take the more she will be harmed. Such a sweet little girl she is. We'll see how well you do."

There was nothing either of them could do. Killing Crawford without Aya-Chan nearby would be a stupid move, Nagi would surely kill her if Crawford didn't come back.

"Aya, we'll find her," Yohji assured, glaring at Crawford. The man was actually smiling .Yohji wanted to beat the life out of him just on principle.

"And you've made friends, how cute. I'll love pulling them apart like broken dolls. That one is lucky to even be alive because of you," he pointed at Akio, who shot him the finger.

"And no suicide bombing will work on me. I can see what you're going to do before you even think about doing it." Yohji hated to admit it, but Crawford was right. With his ability to see the future it was going to be hard to beat him even with their new teammates.

Laufer looked ready to tear his head off, but Aya held up a hand to them, telling them to leave it alone. It was a smart move.

The girls in the shop had no idea what was going on. They continued to look at the flowers and giggle about Aya and Yohji. Akio was fast at work trying to get them to buy something so that they wouldn't notice anything out of place. The last thing they needed was for their identities to be well known amongst the general population.

Yohji was glad the man was right on the ball, because he and Aya were completely shaken, feeling helpless while Crawford grinned in their faces. This was so not good.

"See you later, kittens," Crawford turned on his heel and walked out like nothing had happened.


	31. Chapter 31

Chapter 31

Aya didn't know what to do with himself. He'd flipped a tracer onto Crawford's back when the man had left, but the man had just reached around and pulled it off. That pissed him off more than anything.

"Aya, try to relax, you're not going to do anyone any good by getting all pissed off. You need to be thinking clearly," Yohji said very cautiously. Aya glared at him before marching over to the doors and putting up the closed sign.

"Just great, Aya, except for one thing, there's tonnes of people still in the shop!" Ken teased, having heard Aya and Yohji arguing and had come to see if he could do any damage control.

Aya glared at Ken before going for the hose.

"Everyone needs to leave now," Aya warned. The girls in the shop looked from Aya to the hose with wide eyes.

"He's serious, girls. His…uh, his Aunt's coming over and doesn't know he's gay," Yohji announced. Aya punched him as hard as he could. This was not the time to be joking around!

The girls ran for the doors.

"That is so bad for business!" Omi griped, locking the doors. Aya took a step toward Omi. That's all it took for the boy to back off with his hands raised in the air.

"Aya, why don't you go and sit down," Akio suggested. Aya sprayed him with the hose before dropping it to the floor.

"Do I really smell that bad?" Akio laughed, following him. Aya was going to kill him!

Yohji caught Aya before he could make a move to hurt the man, catching his wrist and pinning his arm behind his back, shoving him face first against the wall.

"You going to calm down?" Yohji asked. Aya wasn't going to dignify that with a response. No, he couldn't calm down! Aya-Chan was left with those two freaks! The only plus side was that at least she wasn't with Shuldig and Farfarello, he'd taken care of those two.

"Aya, you going to calm down?" Yohji asked again. Aya slid his foot backward, trying to slide it behind Yohji's legs. The man only laughed and kicked his foot away.

"Do I look stupid to you, Aya? Trying to trip me? Why don't you just admit that I've won this time," Yohji leaned in and kissed his temple.

Aya slammed his head back into Yohji's and yanked his arm away with a sickening pop. He gasped. That hurt like hell!

"Can you at least act like an adult, Aya?" Yohji shouted, stomping toward him. Aya backed up, ready to fight. If Yohji thought he as just going to stand there and let him put him in another arm lock he was sadly mistaken.

"Give me your arm, idiot, I have to help you get it back into the socket right," Yohji held a hand out to him.

"I'm not stupid, Yohji," Aya hissed, positioning his arm and slamming it as hard as he could into the wall. He shuddered with pain. It wasn't the worst pain he'd ever felt, but it still hurt nonetheless.

Yohji threw his hands up in the air, shouting about trust and something else, Aya tuned him out.

"They would have to have here somewhere that no one would hear her scream. Its not the same as when they had you, Aya, because you would never lower yourself to scream for help, right?" Yohji pointed out.

That caught Aya's attention. He was right. They had kept him in sound proof rooms at first, like they thought he would bother trying to cry for help. If he couldn't help himself then he didn't want help, that was his philosophy, except for where Yohji was concerned. He'd wanted to call out for Yohji a few times, but even then he hadn't.

"Can you think of anywhere you've been that might…"

"Hn," Aya was trying to think, if Yohji would quit talking he would be able to hear his own thoughts.

"It could be anywhere, really. I mean you were in an abandoned nuthouse for a while, um…"

"Think in your head!" Aya finally snapped. Yohji snorted, grinning at him. What the hell was so funny? No, he didn't have time to waste on fighting Yohji, he had to think of places to start.

"Go to the nuthouse, Yohji, I'm going to the mansion. Omi, go to…"

"No, we all go together or not at all. There's no way we'll stand a chance against those two if we split up. Sit down, Aya, we need to go through the list of places where you were kept. You need to tell us which ones were equipped to hold a teenage girl. Places where they assume that they don't really need to do anything to keep her put. I mean Aya-Chan couldn't fight her way out of a wet paper bag. She hasn't had to because before she was comatose you always took care of her," Yohji grabbed him by the shoulders and steered him into the dining room, pushing him down into the chair.

"Somewhere with a bathroom, maybe? I mean I don't think a guy like Crawford is going to put up with…"

"They all had bathrooms, Yohji," Aya interrupted. What, did Yohji think that Aya hadn't had to go to the bathroom the entire time they'd kept him?

"Okay, um, well, I guess one where they wouldn't have to hear her bitch? Women love to bitch, I bet you didn't say a word that wasn't some sort of calm threat. I highly doubt they had to listen to you. I mean lets face it, soundproof only means that the outside world can't hear her. So they have to have her somewhere where they can avoid hearing her."

"Unless they cut her tongue out," Aya mused. Yohji smacked him in the back of the head, startling him.

"I highly doubt he would cut her tongue out, Aya. If anything he wants her to be able to scream to distract you when we find her, right?" He had a point.

"The crypt would be easy to keep her quiet. They stayed nearby, but not actually in there with me. We could check there," Aya mused.

"Shit, I knew we couldn't figure out one of those places. You were in a crypt? For two weeks?" Yohji looked disturbed.

"Hn," yeah, he had been. He hated to think of what Aya-Chan would be going through right now. I mean dead things were the norm for Weiss, so Aya hadn't been too concerned with the bodies and such, but Aya-Chan would be in hysterics.

"Was it old? Or were there…"

"There were bodies in there, it's a crypt, think!" Aya interrupted Akio.

"Okay, where is it?" that was the real question, now wasn't it? Aya hadn't known where the hell he was other than in a crypt. Shuldig had put a mind-fuck on him every time they moved from location to location.

"I don't know," Aya admitted.

Author`s notes: thanks chinchan for your review. :)


	32. Chapter 32

Chapter 31

Yohji had tried to convince Aya to wait for a moment, but he had gotten into mission gear and rushed out the door. Yohji barely had time to change and jump in the car with him. The others weren't so lucky. He hoped they were quick enough to get into Akio's car so that they would have some back up.

"Any idea which crypt we're looking for?" Yohji asked. There weren't many of them that could hold someone prisoner, but he still didn't want to have to go to every single one of them. The longer it took the more of an ass Aya was going to be. Besides, he liked Aya-Chan. She was always sweet and full of energy. Yohji wasn't about to let a cute girl like her get hurt if he could help it.

"You didn't see anything? What about when they brought you food. You had to eat, right, so you didn't get a look…"

"They sent Farfarello in to beat the shit out of me and then they would leave food. I didn't get much warning." there was something he was leaving out. Yohji could practically see the wheels turning in his head. Aya was remembering something important and wasn't sharing.

"You're an ass. You do know we're on the same team, right?" Yohji needed a cigarette in the worst way, but he wasn't going to hang out the window like a dog just because Aya was temperamental.

"You don't need to come with me. I can pull over and you can get the hell out." Testament to his word the Porsche came to a dead halt, throwing Yohji forward into his seatbelt.

"We stopping for a reason?" Yohji asked, playing dumb.

"Get out! I don't need your…" Yohji grabbed Aya and kissed him hard. He wasn't about to let him finish that sentence!

"Fuck you, Aya. Now start driving," Yohji whispered against his lips. Aya just nodded, drawing away to start driving again. _I've still got it. _Yohji thought with a smug grin.

Yohji picked up his cellphone and dialled Ken. He quickly started naming the streets they were passing.

"They don't need to…"

"They already are, so deal with it," Yohji waved out the window at the other car.

"I don't need them in my business. This is my business, not a mission," Aya reminded him.

"So you're saying that you don't want any help, you're willing to take the chance that they'll kick our asses and Aya-Chan will die?" Yohji had to get through that thick skull.

"Crawford walked right up to us in broad daylight and I didn't see you following him right away, which means you had to try to think strategy for a moment, and strategy against two psychics, well, it doesn't take a genius to do the math, kay?" Aya shocked him by nodding as he parked..

"Good. You ready?" Yohji took Aya's hand in his own, easing it off the steering wheel.

"How do you figure its this one?" Ken asked as he ran up to the window.

"Its old enough," Aya said. Yohji was relieved to see everyone in mission gear with weapons ready. It was dark. It had taken Aya the better part of the day driving, so they should be able to sneak in undetected.

"We'll take the front. Omi, you wait out here with Ken in case they try to escape. Akio, have one of yours distract any innocent person who might end up in the wrong place at the wrong time," Aya said, looking the place over.

"I remember when I was in there hearing…" Aya was walking away while he was talking. Shit! Yohji caught up quickly, slapping in his earpiece so that he could hear the others and the others could catch somewhat of what Aya was saying.

Yohji wanted to grab him and throw him behind, he didn't want Aya to go in first, not after the shit he'd pulled last time.

"Is there a problem?" Aya asked with a glare. Yohji wasn't even going to dignify that with an answer. Of course there was a problem! They were going up against Schwartz again!

Aya was looking around, looking for what? Aya pointed to a pond. Who the hell put a pond in a cemetery?

That was apparently all Aya needed, because he stormed up to the church. There was a metal grate. Yohji wanted to tease him. _They kept you in here because you're too damned stupid to scream and have someone save you!_

He kept quiet, and not because Aya would take a swing at him, but because they had to sneak in. How they were going to do that was beyond him. Old metal like that would creak at the very least.

Aya didn't seem to care. Yohji followed his lead and grabbed some of the bars and pulled as hard as he could until the grate swung open with a loud crack.

With barely enough time to look Yohji followed Aya inside, jumping down to the ground.

Yohji caught movement to his left and let his wires loose, wrapping it around the person. He didn't have time to worry about who it was, he had to kill everyone that stood between them and Aya-Chan. The rest of the team was right behind them. Everyone was already engaged in a fight. Difference was that everyone was using weapons, whereas Aya wasn't using the sword that he had on him, he was using fists. What the hell was he thinking?

"Aya-Chan?" Aya shouted. Yohji wanted to smack him for that. The man should focus on surviving the fight against the goons that were surrounding them first, then worry about where his sister was!

"She's not here! She would've answered!" Aya shouted back at him. Apparently Aya was waiting before killing anyone, always wanting to keep up the image of the normal caring brother. Yohji was going to freaking kill him!

"Asshole!" Yohji shouted at him. He was going to smack the hell out of him later! He finally focused on his own fight when he watched Aya finally raise his sword and start fighting like he meant it.

Any signs of Schwartz?" Yohji shouted into the comm. Negative from both Omi and Ken. What the hell!

"Wow, you boys look awful. I can actually see blood dripping from your hair, Ran," Crawford stepped into view, clapping with a wicked twinge in his eye.

"Don't worry, your sister can hear you. She can see you, too. Of course she's not here, she's with Nagi right now staring at the television, probably crying her eyes out right now. Rightfully so, too. You are a truly despicable person. And look how many you killed so easily. You must've done this before. Tell me, how many have you killed over the years? Your sister swore up and down that you would never hurt anyone, that we were mistaken. I asked her if she really thought four men could really live comfortable off the sales from a flower shop. What a naïve girl. And with all the fighting skills you have you never once showed her how to defend herself. I always knew Shuldig would die because of his own stupid games. Did you know your sister would die because of yours?"

Yohji whipped his wires at Crawford, catching him around the neck.

"You could do that. Of course your sister will die," Yohji pulled anyway, slitting Crawford's throat. The psychic clearly hadn't seen that part.

"Yohji!" Aya shouted, pointing the sword at him.

"Think realistically, Aya! Crawford is the one that would hurt her the most! Did you really want to let him go again and have him return to where he's keeping her? Want two psychics to fight instead of one?" Yohji shouted back. This was going to go very badly.

Aya dropped his sword shaking all over. Yohji didn't need words to know why. It was finally sinking into Aya's thick head that his sister really knew what he'd become. Yohji did the only thing he could. He wrapped his arms around him and held on tight.


	33. Chapter 33

Chapter 33

Aya felt so lost. It should piss him off that everyone was handling him with kid gloves, but he couldn't seem to make himself care about that. Right now the only thing going through his head was that Aya-Chan knew about him and every horrible thing he had done with Weiss.

He wouldn't report her to Kritiker no matter what she knew. She could hate him all she wanted, but he wasn't about to have her killed for it.

"Aya, are you going to be okay?" Yohji asked for what must've been the millionth time. No he wasn't alright! He'd just lost Aya-Chan! Yohji settled for massaging his shoulders to try to loosen him up.

"Aya, can I see your sword for a moment?" Akio was leaning over the dining room table toward him. Did he still have it in hi hands? He looked down and confirmed it. He reached past Akio and handed the sword to Ken. If the blue haired man took offence he didn't show it.

They were all being so kind to him. He didn't deserve it. He didn't deserve anything. His sins had been laid out for his innocent sister. He'd shamed her.

"Aya, where would Nagi hide? It has to be somewhere with cable. Do you think it might be at the mansion with all the flowers?" Yohji asked, running his fingers through Aya's hair.

Aya shrugged. He had no idea where she could be. Every place Schwartz had taken him to once he wouldn't fight anymore had televisions and the works. Shuldig wouldn't have gone without.

"Well, why don't you go and have a shower. Maybe once you clean off all the blood you'll be thinking properly," Yohji suggested, taking him by the arm and helping him to his feet.

"I don't know what to do anymore," Aya said very quietly as he let Yohji drag him to the shower. Yohji didn't try anything funny, he just helped him clean off the blood and grime. Aya was glad. He couldn't handle even Yohji's gentler touches right now. What he really wanted was to peel off his skin and try to see if somewhere inside was the person that he used to be, the person that Aya-Chan would still love. Even if he did though, he was sure he would come out empty handed.

He wasn't who he used to be, not on the inside or the outside. He could pretend, offer Aya-Chan some smiles and pretend that he didn't want to kill everyone that even looked at her the wrong way. He loved her, but the only person that he could truly be himself with was Yohji. There were no misconceptions of who he was and what he was capable of. Yohji had seen Aya kill a thousand times and still smiled at him like that. Yohji didn't expect him to pretend to be happy when he wasn't. But Yohji didn't know who he used to be. Yohji didn't see the loss of that innocence because he had never known it.

"When a normal boy becomes a killer it isn't because he likes the idea. He doesn't fantasize about it until it borderlines on obsession.. You didn't just decide to kill because you were bored. You decided to kill because innocent people had been killed. If you didn't kill those people then they would've hurt people the way you were hurt," Yohji said like he could read his mind. Aya looked up at him. Yohji looked pained as he cupped Aya's cheek in his hand.

"A teenage girl won't understand that, Yohji. I don't even understand it. I'm a murderer and I can't even remember the first time that I decided my sword was a real weapon and not just a series of fluid movements. It was more like a dance, and now I cling to it and use it to…"

"I know that. I was older when I started killing, but I still wasn't born a killer. But who understands better than us that these people have to be stopped? If we didn't kill then people like Takatori would completely overrun things. Keep that in mind. There is always a pro and a con. You can't just look a the negative. Would you really want the man who destroyed your family to completely rule things? Or what about Shuldig? Would you have Farfarello running the streets torturing people because it 'hurts god'? The people that we kill deserve to die for their crimes. The legal system is shit, even Persia knew it."

Aya nodded, he knew what he was saying, but still, he was an adult. Aya-Chan wouldn't see things that way, she was just a girl. And she was in a coma for years, so her mind was even more innocent than the girls he'd met over the years. Aya-Chan didn't even have a boyfriend for god sakes!

Aya stepped out of the shower with Yohji.

"You alive in there?" Yohji teased, kissing his temple. Aya nodded. He felt cold and numb, but he was starting to focus.

"Good. You scared the shit out of everyone. Your eyes were completely dead. It was like you weren't in there at all. I even hit you a couple times. Hell, the only thing I couldn't do was make you hit yourself, and believe me I tried."

"I know." Aya well remembered Yohji grabbing his wrist and trying to make him slap himself. "What am I going to say to her when we find her?" Aya asked, slipping on a towel and following Yohji down the hall. They needed a change of clothes.

"You're going to cover her mouth to keep her from screaming and we'll drag her out of that place. There isn't much else we can do. If she goes into hysterics someone might call the cops. We have to treat it like a kidnapping if she freaks. You have to be realistic, of course. I can't promise she won't freak. I wish she would just laugh and skip away like she always did when she was heading out the door. But even though I wish she would react like nothing had happened the chances are that she is going to freak. I mean who wouldn't? She's a delicate girl, and not only are her parents dead, but she was in a coma and now she's been kidnapped by Schwartz and learns that her brother and his friends are killers. There is nothing normal in her life. So all I can suggest is treat it like a kidnapping."

Aya nodded. He hated to admit it, but Yohji was right, they were going to have to kidnap Aya-Chan.


	34. Chapter 34

Chapter 34

Yohji rolled his eyes as he watched Aya clean the blood off his coat. Couldn't the man sit down to think like normal people? Instead they were all naming places they'd known he had been taken to and waiting for him to answer to any of them. He wasn't ignoring them, he was just thinking without sharing. Everyone was starting to get frustrated with his silence.

"Aya?" Omi interrupted all of the shouted locations.

Aya looked at him, and the look wasn't nice. Aya hated being interrupted when he was trying to think on something like this.

"Sorry, uh, the phone's for you. Sounds like Nagi," Omi shoved the phone into his hands and backed up quickly like he thought Aya was going to hit him with it.

"Where is she?" Aya asked. Yohji should've expected that. He would've at least said hello to make sure it was Nagi and not a customer.

Aya hung up the phone and grinned at them.

"Apparently Nagi doesn't like drawing things out when he's alone. She's at the house with the roses, the one where you found me." Aya shuddered at the memory. If Yohji hadn't come for him his imagination could tell him exactly what would've happened to him.

"So what's the plan?" Yohji pulled on his coat as he watched Aya throw his on.

"We go in and get her," Aya said, grabbing his sword and rushing toward the door. Yohji was right behind him, and thankfully the others had learned from last time to get themselves out the damned door.

"Ken and Omi are riding with us this time. You guys are gonna follow. Park a block away and sneak in the back way. We're going in the front door!" Yohji shouted over his shoulder as he raced after Aya to where he parked his Porsche.

"You sure you want to come with me? Its not a mission," Aya paused to remind everyone.

"Just looking out for our own, Abyssinian. We might not be permanently paired together, but we still aren't going to let you two rush in alone. Be careful," Akio waved. The other guys made affirmative noises.

Yohji kissed Aya's cheek and made his way to the passenger door. He didn't know if they were going to survive against Nagi being that the kid was ready for them. His only plan was to have a gun hidden on him. Nagi could jam a gun easily, so he would have to wait until the kid was focused on someone else before he shot.

His biggest worry was that Aya-Chan would already be dead before they got there. Nagi might not find her useful once he knew they were coming for her. And if Aya-Chan died Aya would die with her. The asshole probably wouldn't even attempt to survive. He'd be even more far gone than he had been when she'd found out about them.

Yohji ignored Aya's usual rules of the car and lit a cigarette. He expected Aya to freak, but the redhead only rolled down both windows. Aya knew their odds as well as Yohji did, apparently.

"Wow, had I known we'd be moving out this quickly I'd have fucked you in the shower," Yohji teased, even though it was true, it still made Aya's lip twitch in one of those almost-smiles Yohji had come to love.

Of course Yohji would have to have Aya's back better than ever. The man was going to get distracted the second he saw his sister. He wouldn't fight as smart as usual, he was going to be so focused on getting to her he was going to end up leaving himself wide open to one of Nagi's attacks. Yohji could sympathise, though. When Aya was kept by Schwartz he had been the same, running in blind. He had been lucky that Schwartz had taken off instead of staying to fight.

If Ken and Omi weren't in the back he would probably be playing with Aya's zipper by now, trying to take the redhead's mind off his worry.

"How about some music?" Yohji smirked, cranking the radio onto one of the local rock stations.

Yohji rolled his eyes as Aya reached over and turned it down. At least he was keeping it on, though.

"We really don't need the police chasing us for being too loud in the middle of the night, do we?" Omi pointed out. Okay, so that was a good point. No sense adding attention to themselves.

"Do we have an actual plan, or are we just running in blind?" Ken asked, sounding worried.

"Running in blind, right, Aya?" Yohji was pretty sure that was the plan.

"You can't plan for Nagi," Aya said in a deadpan.

"I think the plan is for all of us to have Aya's back, more or less," Yohji said, grinning when Aya took a second to glare at him.

"Don't pretend you're too smart to get distracted, Aya. Look what happened last time! You weren't going to kill anyone until you thought your sister was somewhere else. And you didn't try to kill Crawford. Hell, you even told me not to. The best we can do is back you up and try to kill the bastard if we get the chance."

Yohji reached over and closed his hand over one of Aya's where it gripped the steering wheel.

Everyone was thrown forward when Aya slammed the car into park.

"Shit, a word of warning!" Ken griped, rubbing at his forehead where it had hit the seat.

"Everyone okay?" Yohji asked. Omi was all over the place.

"Wear seatbelts next time," Aya snapped at them. Yohji knew better than to go without after having had Aya do that to him a thousand times.

Yohji slid out of the car and walked over to Aya. He leaned in and kissed him hard. Aya's hand tangled in his hair as he kissed back fiercely.

"Get a room, guys," Ken snorted.

"Oh please, Ken. If we live you're going to be playing with yourself to that image and you know it!" Yohji laughed as Ken blushed bright red.

"Its okay, Ken, we can play together," Omi teased, hugging him with a little laugh.

"You two always that rough?" Ken asked. Aya choked, blushing bright red.

"We're grown ups. You two can have your little boy love all you want," Yohji snorted, putting out his cigarette. "You should see the teeth marks Aya leaves behind!"

"Yohji!" Aya looked like he was about to die of embarrassment. Well, Yohji had taken his mind off his sister for a moment. They deserved one last laugh together in case it was the end.

"Abyssinian, are you blushing?" Akio's voice rang out. Yohji chuckled and grabbed Aya's hand, linking their fingers.

"Ken was just asking about the birds and the bees and so I told him." Yohji winked at the guys as they walked over.

"I was not!" Ken was grinning, too.

"No, he was just asking about Aya and Yohji's birds and bees," Omi giggled, kissing Ken's cheek.

"Well, they are a pretty hot couple, neh?" Akio was looking around, trying to spot where they were supposed to go.

"If you go that way, you can sneak through the field in the back and head up to the house. You won't be able to miss it. There's a huge amount of roses all the way around the place. It reeks of them," Ken pointed in the direction of the field that they had used last time.

"Alright. We'll wait around back and once we hear the shit starting to hit the fan we'll run in. Sound good?" Yohji nodded. It was better than nothing.


	35. Chapter 35

Chapter 35

Aya could feel his heart hammering in his chest as he closed his hand around the doorknob. This was really it. He turned the knob and crept into the house with the other three behind him.

"I'm glad you could make it," Nagi rounded the corner, smirking at them.

"Where is she?" Aya demaded. Nagi gestured behind him. Aya peered into the hall, his eyes finding Aya-Chan's terrified ones. She was sitting on the floor with the laptop in her lap, staring at him.

"Look at him, Aya! Look at that monster! Your brother is dead! This is what you've been hugging!" Nagi said to her, looking pissed off. It was odd to see much in the way of emotion from Nagi, the boy was pretty monotone most of the time. Aya had only seen him pissed off once before and that was when Tot was killed.

Apparently he actually cared about Schwartz. Aya had always thought he was just using them as a means to an end.

Aya launched himself at Nagi, swinging the sword at his neck. Nagi ducked, but Aya managed to cut his shoulder when he swept the sword back down at him.

"The only people who can love a murderer are murderers themselves, right Yohji? Or at least that's what you tell Ran when you fuck him," Nagi was grinning, pleased with himself for having given Aya-Chan the other piece of information Aya hadn't told her.

Aya-Chan's eyes darted from Yohji to Aya in disbelief.

"Shut up!" Aya snarled, swinging at him again. Nagi held out one hand and all four of them were flung at the wall hard enough to leave dents and to make Aya drop his sword.

Aya focused on Nagi, not on Laufer as they started to close in on him from behind. Nagi turned and sent them flying as well. This time though, when they left blood splatter from their heads as they hit. Akio was the only one who was moving. Aya could surmise a guess that the others were dead that easily. Nagi had left Weiss alive on purpose.

Akio was making his way toward Aya-Chan. He was using his elbows to crawl, and the way his legs were Aya could guess that they were probably both broken.

"Let Aya-Chan go, she has nothing to do with this!" Yohji pleaded with Nagi.

"She has to do with him and he has to do with you," Nagi pointed at Aya. Aya had nothing to say to that. Nagi knew that he wanted Aya-Chan safe, pleading wouldn't tell him anything he didn't already know.

"The mistakes Schwartz made were because they underestimated you and relied on tricks and games to destroy you. Shuldig was caught in his own game by relying on reading your minds to see what you wanted. Farfarello didn't think you would learn any new tricks, Ran. And Crawford was relying on you worrying about your sister's location too much to kill him. I have no misconceptions. If I give you a chance you will kill me. I already know that. I'm not going to play games, but I am going to make it hurt," Nagi was using that power of his to hold them all down while he calmly walked over to them with a knife in hand.

Aya wasn't stupid enough to think that Nagi wasn't going to kill him first. Nagi didn't care if Aya saw the rest of his team, even Yohji, die. He was content with having taken Aya-Chan away from him and giving him the knowledge that he was going to kill the others next.

Nagi knelt down in front of him and stabbed hard into his shoulder, twisting the knife. Aya hissed in pain, glaring at him. He refused to scream, but he couldn't hide that it hurt.

"I wonder how many times I can stab you before you die. You have a lot of stamina from what I saw from Farfarello. So this will take a while," Nagi was grinning as he pulled the knife out and grabbed Aya's hand, pinning it to the wall he stabbed again right through the palm and started twisting it around.

"Stop it! If you're going to kill him then kill him!" Yohji shouted. Aya would've smiled at that if he weren't in pain.

Aya looked up as a shadow fell on the two of them, just in time to see Aya-Chan slam the laptop down onto Nagi's head. She screamed, beating him over the head with it over and over until he wasn't moving anymore.

"Women are scary," Ken muttered, Omi just nodded.

"Ran?" Aya-Chan looked at his wounds. She reached over and lay her hands on his cheeks, tears streaming from her eyes as she looked him in the eye.

"Aya, I'm…"

"I'm sorry, Ran. Its because of Mom and Dad, right? I'm sorry! I should've known something was wrong! I should've…" she was sobbing as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

Aya closed his eyes, leaning into her. He couldn't really hold onto her, but he did his best with his un-injured arm.

"Are you okay, Aya-Chan?" Yohji asked, startling Aya. He'd forgotten everything but her for a moment. He had to get everyone to the flower shop. They couldn't take the chance of some neighbour calling the cops.

"I'm fine. They didn't really hurt me. Its Ran, he's bleeding pretty badly." Aya drew back and looked down. He was bleeding a lot.

Omi and Ken grabbed Akio and put him in the other car. Akio didn't argue when Omi got behind the wheel.

"He'll be fine. We'll get him to the car and patch him up," Yohji assured her. Aya let Yohji pull him to his feet, wrapping his good arm around his shoulders and helping him stagger out of the place.

Ken tried to get Aya-Chan in the front seat so that she wouldn't have to see, but she insisted on riding in the back with Aya and Yohji while Yohji pulled Aya's coat off and cut his shirt away to see the shoulder injury. He tore the shirt into strips and handed one to Aya-Chan so that she could put pressure on the wound in his hand.

"Is he going to be alright?" she was asking in a shaky voice. Aya's vision was going gray. Aya-Chan had brought him back twice now by slapping him in the face. The girl hit way harder than she knew. But now he couldn't stay awake.

"He'll be fine, we're taking him to the hospital. These need to be stitched," Aya heard Yohji say. The man was confident about it. Aya knew he wasn't dying, he just had to shut down for a while like a computer when the battery's been drained.

Author's notes: Thank you cheencheen for your review. =)

I don't know how to spell her name, so I looked at other stories and the majority of what I wrote said Tot. some also said Toto, and one other said Tote, so I'm going with the majority.


	36. Chapter 36

Chapter 36

Yohji sat down beside Aya-Chan in the waiting room.

"Are you sure he's going to be fine?" she asked, her hands shaking. Yohji closed his hands over hers to still them.

"He's been through worse. I wouldn't lie about him going to be alright if I didn't think he would. I don't like lying to women or girls. You have to know that Ran hated lying to you, too. But he never wanted anything like this to touch your life again. He wanted you to live a normal life." She was taking it far better than he had expected.

"How are you dealing with all this? I mean I know you've been through hell. How do you feel?" Yohji half expected her to go into sudden hysterics or something at the question, but she only nodded.

"And I already know what you're thinking. I won't tell anyone about you. It wouldn't be right," she said, looking up at him.

Yohji nodded. He wished he could peek inside her head to know what was going on in there. He believed her that she wouldn't tell, that wasn't it, he was dreading that she really wasn't okay at all and that she was going to leave Aya behind without a backward glance. If she did that it would kill him.

"Do you understand everything that's been…"

"He's my brother, but he's different. I know that. I mean whenever I visited I knew something was different, but I thought it was just because he was an adult now. I didn't know it was because he'd really changed. I should've been there for him. I never would've tried to stop him from continuing to… I just would've liked to hold his hand through it. He's so closed off from me. I don't know what I should do. Have I been a nuisance to him?" she looked so sad. Yohji felt for her.

"No, you're one of the only things that makes him smile. I had never seen him smile until you woke up. He's changed, but he's still the same. I think one of the hardest things for him was keeping this from you. He's always felt that he was too tainted to be happy. A very definite part of him died when everything went to hell for the two of you. I know some of the details, but not all of it, and its not my business. But I know that if you were to stop coming by he would retreat back into his shell and none of us would be able to find him again. He never let us call him Ran because he felt that part of him was dead, but he let you call him that because he wanted that part of him to be alive for you. I don't know if that makes any sense." Yohji knew he was going to have to be the one to explain these things to her, otherwise she would be in the dark forever, because Aya sure as hell wasn't going to. And if she was kept in the dark she might start to resent her brother for not opening up to her.

"What do you usually call him, then? I heard them say Abyssinian, like the cat, right? Is that what you call him?"

"When we're out on missions he's called that, but usually he uses your name. You'll have to ask him about that part, but if I had to guess I'd say its because it reminds him of what he fights for." Oh, Yohji knew he was going to be listening to Aya bitch about that one. The man wasn't going to be pleased about his sister knowing he was using her name.

"What about you, Yohji? You care about my brother, right?" and on to the personal questions.

"I love your brother and I like to think he loves me too. Does that bother you?" Yohji dreaded the answer to that one, too. If she didn't approve then…

"No. I'm glad he has someone that he can lean on. My shoulders aren't big enough," she winked at him. Yohji chuckled. She was so cute.

"Ran and I…"

"If you don't normally call him that then don't on my account," she interrupted, surprising him again.

"Aya and I have only been together for the past quarter. He and I hadn't hidden it from you, we hadn't seen you since we'd gotten together. He was such an asshole all the time that I never really got to know him as anything other than a good man to have your back on missions. Then he got hurt pretty bad and I helped take care of him. We kind of got together after that. To be honest I have no idea of the how's and if's of explaining these things to you when we saw you next. Chances are Aya would've treated me different when you were around. I had no problem with that. You're so important to him that it was probably the only thing he could've done. He didn't want to alienate you. None of us did." he finally released her hands now that they were done trembling.

"You know, I teased him a few times about how it was strange that four people so completely different in personality could get along well enough to not only work together every day but also share an apartment. I guess I wasn't all that far off," she giggled.

"I bet it was pretty awkward for all of you whenever I'd come to visit."

"The first time Aya told us you were coming to visit we all about had heart attacks. We had no idea what we were in for. We were expecting some stuck up little bitch to be honest. We thought for the most part that we were going to have to stay completely clear of you so that we wouldn't have things so awkward that you would suspect things. But when we met you we all genuinely liked having you over. It was seeing your brother smile that nearly gave us the heart attacks," Yohji had stared when he'd seen Aya smile. What had been even stranger was that it wasn't a faked smile. Yohji had to reign himself in before he could tease him about it. Teasing him around Aya-Chan would make it obvious that he didn't smile often, and teasing him without Aya-Chan would've resulted in fighting for his life.

"The real question, Aya-Chan, is what are you going to do now?"

"I'm off for a few weeks, so I'll be staying nearby to visit. I'll finish my schooling and then I'll come back. I can come back, right?" she asked with worried eyes.

"Its fine as long as no one knows that you know. Even if we ended up with a new member that new member would never be able to know you knew. Its very important that you understand that. If anyone found out that you knew anything the kill order would be put on you. Not only would you die but we all would, because we would try to protect you. I think Akio knows what's good for him and can keep his mouth shut. I'm going to talk to him as soon as he's available."

Speaking of which, the others still hadn't shown up at the hospital yet. He hoped they hadn't run into any sort of trouble. I mean Schwartz didn't have any friends, did they?

He nearly jumped out of his skin when the doors banged open. There they were.

"Took you guys long enough," Yohji shouted over to them.

"Bite me! We ran out of gas a few blocks from here!" Ken shouted at him, wrestling with Akio's weight. Omi was helping by holding the doors for him. Yohji knew from experience that Omi was too small to really help carry anyone.

Author's notes: Thanks chinchan for your reviews. =)

There's still a bit more for the story. Not much, but a little bit.


	37. Chapter 37

Chapter 37

Aya's eyes slid open. He felt so tired and his limbs felt heavy. Looking around he was glad to note that he was back at the apartment sleeping on the couch.

"About time you woke up, lazy," Yohji teased, tracing his cheek with his knuckles.

"Aya-Chan?" Aya sat up, his shoulder and his hand throbbed.

"She's fine. She's out shopping. She wants to stay by your side. The girl's a lot stronger than we gave her credit for. Must be the Fujimiya genes," Yohji teased, sitting down beside him.

"Is everyone okay?" Aya leaned his head against Yohji's shoulder.

"Akio's legs are in casts, but other than that everyone only has bruises and minor cuts. Akio's being reassigned to another group and I'm allowed to stay here with you. Aya-Chan promised not to say a word and Akio won't tell on her, he gave his word." Aya smiled at that. Since when did things go their way? He wasn't complaining.

"How are you feeling, Aya?" Yohji leaned over and kissed the top of his head.

"Tired, but I'm fine," Aya raised his head and brushed his lips against Yohji's. Yohji turned and pulled Aya up into his lap. Aya grinned, he could feel Yohji's hardness against him as he straddled him.

"Ken and Omi are out. We have the place to ourselves," Yohji claimed his mouth in a searing kiss. Aya groaned, it felt so good to be connected to someone right now. Aya kissed back, frenzied, his nails digging furrows into Yohji's back that he was sure would be beading blood.

Yohji pulled his own shirt off before his hands skimmed up Aya's torso that was bare save for the bandages.

Aya ground down against him, making Yohji gasp and then smirk at him.

"Just be careful of your stitches, you masochist," Yohji teased, throwing him down onto his back so that he could yank his pants down and off. Yohji stood up and divested himself of all clothing before lowering down on top of him.

Aya slid his legs farther apart to accommodate him.

"How do you want it? You want to ride me or do you want it like this?" Yohji had never asked him anything like that before. Aya could feel his cheeks heating up. Yohji chuckled at that. Aya paused to think. How did he want it? Aya flipped their positions and straddled Yohji's hips. He would be less likely to rip anything this way. Yohji grinned up at him, his hands catching Aya's hips in a bruising grip.

Aya didn't want to be prepped, he wanted it now! He shoved himself down onto Yohji's member, startling the man and making him cry out. It hurt almost too much, but he wanted this. He clawed his fingers into Yohji's chest, drawing up a small amount of blood that he leaned down and licked.

Yohji yanked him down by the back of the neck for a deep kiss. Aya growled into his mouth before he started to move. Yohji was thrusting up against him, adding his own rhythm. It was almost too much. Aya bit into Yohji's shoulder even harder than usual. Apparently it was too hard, because Yohji grabbed him by the hair and dragged him away from the wound.

Aya grinned, knowing he had blood on his lips. He reached down and pulled Yohji up against him, straining the man while he rode him. Yohji took the hint and bit Aya in the same place.

Aya cried out. That was so good! He was coming already, and Yohji wasn't far behind, clawing his fingers into Aya's back the way he liked.

"Damn," Yohji panted, flopping down against the couch. Aya slid off him rising to his feet. He could feel his back and thighs burning from Yohji's nails. He loved the reminder of what they had just done. Yohji had marked him and that always made him feel whole.

"You need to control that bite of yours a bit, babe, I so don't want to have to explain to a doctor why I have a bite mark that needs stitches," Yohji chuckled.

"You love it," Aya smirked back at him. Yohji slid off the couch and came at him, pinning him to the wall and kissing him fiercely. Aya tangled his fingers in Yohji's hair, ignoring the pain in the knife wound. He let Yohji lift him, pulling his legs around his waist and slamming into him again.

Aya gasped, already sensitised from the first time. He kissed back again, biting at Yohji's lower lip before delving into his mouth again.

The door slammed open. Aya leapt out of Yohji's arms, blushing bright red. Ken and Omi were staring at them with glazed eyes. Damn. He couldn't hide all the scratches and the bite mark from them, nor could he pretend they hadn't been screwing up against the wall. He could read Ken's eyes easily, going back to his earlier comment about them being intense and rough.

"Is there a problem?" Aya snapped, using his only self defence.

"N…no!" Ken and Omi both ran upstairs. He knew exactly what they were going to be doing upstairs. The two had looked intrigued enough that Aya knew they were going to give rough a go.

"Mommy and Daddy have officially been caught by the kids," Yohji snickered before pulling Aya back against him. Aya moved back to the wall, turning around and presenting himself to Yohji.

Yohji moulded himself to his back, pressing back inside him.

"I could do this forever," Yohji purred in his ear before nipping at the shell.

"Then do it." Aya challenged, gasping as Yohji started a fast pounding rhythm just the way he liked it.

"I love you so much. So quit getting hurt all the damned time," Yohji teased, panting hard. Yohji's body was so hot against his back, a strong comfort. He gasped as liquid fire shot through his body, he came hard at the feel of Yohji's heat spreading within him.

"Shut up," Aya gasped, turning in his arms, wrapping his arms around Yohji's neck and just leaning on him. Yohji tightened his arms around his waist, just holding him.

"Love you," Aya said very quietly. He felt whole, and finally nothing could come between them. Schwartz was dead and Kritiker had given him his love back.

"I think we should celebrate," Yohji drew back to look him in the eye. Aya dreaded what that implied.

Yohji released him to pull on his pants. Aya did the same, humouring him and following him into the kitchen.

Yohji pulled out a six pack of beer and handed one to Aya.

"It tastes like shit," Aya said, handing it back to him and going in the fridge for a drink he had bought on a whim a week ago.

He pulled out the huge bottle of sake and went in the cupboards for the proper cups.

"Yours is bound to get you drunk a lot quicker," Yohji laughed. Aya shrugged, he didn't care.

Aya knew Yohji wasn't going to drink the sake, the man hated it. So he sat there and drank the entire bottle.

"Hey, Aya, your sister knows you use her name," Yohji said, grinning at him with drunk eyes.

Aya giggled, feeling the world spin around him. He launched at Yohji tackling him to the floor.

"You are such a cute drunk." Yohji tackled him back. They struggled for dominance, laughing so hard that the others came running down the stairs to see what was so damned funny.

"What the hell are you two doing?" Ken asked, chuckling. Aya and Yohji continued to struggle until Aya finally pinned him.

"You saw, I win!" Aya said triumphantly, trying to get to his feet only to fall on his face in a heap of giggles.

"What exactly do you want for your prize?" Yohji asked, sitting up. He helped Aya sit up, laughing.

"Um, you have to cook tonight."

"No drunks by the stove," Ken interrupted. He had a good point, they would probably burn the place down.

"Um, oh! I know, take your clothes off and run down the street screaming that you love me!" Aya giggled. Every time he moved the world moved with him, making him laugh even more. It felt good. Everything had gone to shit for so long that now it didn't matter if he would be totally embarrassed tomorrow, he was happy.

"Done!" Yohji started to strip.

"You two are insane. If the cops drag you in its your own damned fault," Ken reminded.

"What else do you want, Aya?" Yohji asked, sounding disappointed by Ken's reminder.

"Dinner tomorrow? All of us? Your treat?" Aya knew that was probably the only thing that he would get. I mean he could ask for any sexual favours, but he would get them anyway. What he really wanted was for all of them to spend time together before Aya-Chan had to leave for school again.

"Okay. But only if you wear one of those sexy outfits you bought." Aya nodded, he could do that. They were sexy, but not obscene, so he wouldn't be traumatizing Aya-Chan.

He leaned against Yohji's shoulder and smiled.

"Ran, I'm home!" Aya-Chan announced, skipping into the room. She held out a gift to him.

Aya smiled, accepting it. He unwrapped it. A sword cleaning kit. She really was okay with everything. She wasn't just pretending for his sake.

He smiled at her. Things were going to be okay. Missions were going to go back to normal now that Schwartz was dead. He had Yohji by his side and his sister still loved him.

Author's notes: I wanted to end it on sort of a cute note. And what better way than to have Aya plastered and giggly like he was in the first one.

I hope you liked the stories and I hope you liked the final result.

Thank you so much for reading them.

I'm probably going to write some more Yohji Aya fics, but not related to this one. This one is finally finished. ;P


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